This time, even I was stunned.

Was it a gift from my father to my mother? and my father knew nothing about the power of the pen?

"You.... "My mind was completely confused.

"Well," confirmed my father, "I gave this pen to your mother when I was married, and I couldn't even buy her a decent gift when I got married, and your mother happened to like it, so I gave it to her, and I didn't expect her to really think that you would carry it with you." The father stretched out his hand to pick up the pen and look at it, but after thinking about it, he withdrew his hand, "This pen is really a pen of calling?"

"Well, it's been confirmed in the time gap. Where did you get this pen?" I asked.

"My contract youkai. The father said, "It was given to me when I first became a demon slayer." ”

"Is that the dragon in the picture?"

Father nodded.

"Dragon... Why did they give you a pen? Why is your contract monster a dragon? Dragons sound so powerful, but you don't mean you're just an ordinary demon slayer?"

My series of questions made my father a little embarrassed, "You asked so many questions, I don't know which one to answer you first..."

"I'm sorry...", I realized I was in too much of a hurry.

"Why apologize," my father smiled, but it was only for a moment, and he quickly regained his uneasy appearance, "It's a long story, I didn't have a clue when I first wanted to become a demon slayer, I didn't have the ability to do it, I didn't have a partner, I almost gave up." ”

Sounds like nothing when I first started as a ghostwriter.

"I couldn't get orders for the demon killer for a long time, and the money I had with me quickly ran out, so I had to work in a hotel," said my father, "and I found a place to stay temporarily, and that inn was a very old shop, and the old place was always loved by the monsters." ”

"You met your contract youkai at that inn?"

"The innkeeper doesn't see the monsters, but there are often monsters who come to the store, as if they are regular customers," my father didn't answer me directly, "They will naturally greet the owner, usually find a random place in the store, rest for the night and leave, and when they leave, they will consciously leave fruit or other food in return for staying in the hotel, but the boss can't see all this." ”

"But in this case, there will often be inexplicable things in the store that are not in the store, right?"

"That's natural, and it's said that people were scared at first, but because of the hospitality and generosity of the owner's family, over the years this strange phenomenon has become a sign of the store, and many tourists come for it," said the father. ”

"Why do youkai like this inn? Obviously, the boss can't see youkai. ”

"I was puzzled at first, and I even thought that the boss was pretending not to see the monsters, and tried to try it, but every time I came to the conclusion that they really couldn't see the monsters. ”

"Is your contract youkai one of the youkai who came to stay at the hotel?"

"It's? "I met that guy by accident, because he was not a guest of the inn, but lived in the inn all year round, but did not live in the inn." ”

"It's... Is it the guardian of this shop?" I asked.

The father was a little surprised, "Well, that's right, you can guess it." ”

"Because I've encountered similar youkai before," I said, "and it's been guarding a place all along, but it doesn't seem to be there." ”

"Some youkai are born to protect them, but some youkai are guarded for certain reasons. The father said, "The guy in the inn belongs to the latter." ”

"I guess it has something to do with the owner of this shop. ”

"I worked at the hotel for a long time, and I managed to save enough money to meet the boss and prepare to leave the next morning," said my father, "During this time, I met a lot of yokai, learned a lot about them, and became friends with some of them, but I never met that guy once." ”

I think of the grinning dragon in the photo, it seems... It's familiar? But it's just familiar.

"I'm a nostalgic person, and I knew I was going to leave sooner or later before I came to work at the hotel, but I was reluctant to leave when it was time to leave, so I couldn't sleep the night before I left, and I was wondering if I needed to give my boss something when it suddenly became noisy outside," said my father, "and I opened the window to see what was going on, but I choked on the smoke and burst into tears." ”

"Smoke... It's on fire?"

"Well, there was a fire, it seemed that there was a fire in a nearby shop, and the fire spread very quickly, and seeing that the fire had already burned to the inn where I was, I hurriedly got up to wake everyone up," my father recalled, "but at this moment, I suddenly felt a clicking sound on the roof, as if someone was walking on the roof, and almost at the same time, a powerful demonic force appeared on the roof. He mimicked the voice, "But I didn't care so much about it then, and the fire wasn't a joke." ”

"I said how I looked at the dragon in the picture so familiar..."My father's words about the fire and the roof reminded me of where I had seen the dragon, "The guardian of the roof from disaster, the dragon without horns, the dragon." ”

"Who did you learn this from?" my father looked at me for a moment, "I didn't know you when I was your age. ”

"The monster file in the gap in time, I'll look through it when I'm free. I said, "The library has a ghostwriter's area, which contains information about dragons, which were originally unknown creatures from the water, but they have grown into spirits over time, but they have no dragon horns, and they like quiet and sunlight on weekdays, and they often turn into wooden sculptures and lie on the roof, and they are said to have the power to control the water, and they are also monsters that can bring peace." I stumbled across it when I was looking up another water control monster, so I'm a little impressed. ”

"That's right," the father nodded, "then I won't have to explain anything more to you, but the dragon is the name that people give it, and its real name is called..."

Was he worried that if I knew the name of the dragon, he would hurt it?

"It's okay, it's okay if you don't have to tell me its name. I said.

"I'd better tell you your name with its approval. Father explained.

I nodded.

"Come, let's continue talking about the fire at the inn," said the father, "and I was about to wake up the boss when suddenly a voice from the window said to me, 'Don't do much, sit down.'" I looked back and saw a dragon outside the window, I had never seen a dragon before, it was still such a big dragon, and I was stupid at that time, and I saw it circle around the inn, and the flames really went around our house. ”

"It used water to disperse the fire?"

"According to what the dragon later told me, it wrapped the house with water, which saved the historic inn. "The next morning, all the shops along the street were more or less affected by the fire, but the inn where I was located was not damaged in the slightest. ”

“... Do they know about the existence of the Dragon?"

The innkeeper said that this shop was a shop that had been passed down from generation to generation, and the story of the dragon had been passed down from generation to generation, and that his generation had actually become a child's bedtime story, and if it weren't for this bizarre luck, the boss wouldn't have believed that the dragon that could avoid disaster in that story really existed. ”

"Didn't you tell him what the dragon did at night?"

"Of course not, then, as now, seeing a yokai is like a ghost story to ordinary people," said my father, "and I made an excuse to stay in the shop for a few more days out of curiosity, on the one hand, to ask what the story of my ancestors was, and on the other hand, to find a chance to see the dragon again." ”

"You didn't think the dragon would become your contract monster back then, did you?" I asked.

"I didn't dare to think of it," said my father, "but I guess the fellow didn't expect that one day it would leave the inn that had been guarded for hundreds of years and set out on my journey." ”

(End of chapter)