Mills stood there blankly, holding the filthy cookie tin for seven or eight minutes. If not for Jim's voice in the background of the recording and the constantly changing numbers, time itself seemed to have stopped.
Then he suddenly took a step back and ran toward the window like a madman. Jim immediately threw away the phone and rushed over, trying to pin him down.
After a struggle, Jim grabbed the ice bucket. From the way he held it, he looked ready to smash it over Mills's head. Instead, the ice and water inside drenched Mills from head to toe, and he quickly came to his senses.
After an exhausting night and the fatigue of travel, Mills could no longer wake up feeling refreshed the next morning the way he had in his early twenties.
He looked haggard, and he had not even shaved his stubble cleanly. He certainly could not go to church looking like this, especially not on a Sunday, when many families would be attending Mass.
But he was eager to deal with that strange box and continue investigating Angela Warren's case, so early that morning, he hailed a taxi to the contact point the church had told him about.
Night Parade of One Hundred Demons often originated from legends of Tsukumogami. In Japanese mythology, objects that had existed for a hundred years would become monsters. These objects could be flowerpots, umbrellas, lanterns, bronze mirrors, and so on, but they vanished when the morning sun shone upon the earth.
Mills had no idea whether a monk would listen to a priest, but he could not be bothered to care that much. Next time, he would never investigate two cases at once.
When he entered the priests' office area through the church's back door, Mills found that the