"Shuko... my Shuko..."
A young wife stood by the street, wailing, while her husband anxiously stopped one passerby after another.
"Have you seen a girl wearing a kimono with red hydrangeas?"
"Has anyone seen a seven-year-old girl about this tall?"
But no matter how desperate he was, the passersby could only shake their heads helplessly.
A child really had gone missing.
Heavyhearted, Haruto stepped forward and asked as gently as he could, "Where did your child go missing? I might be able to help."
The man gripped Haruto's hand as though clutching a lifeline. "Right here on this street! We only turned away for a moment, and Shuko was gone!"
"Do you have any other clues? That leaves us with too much of the street to search."
The man's grip hurt his hand, but Haruto continued asking gently without so much as a frown.
"Clues..." The man lowered his head, at a loss for words, but his wife suddenly looked up behind him as though something had struck her. "Goldfish! Shuko said she wanted to see the goldfish! She must have seen a goldfish-scooping stall!"
But...
Haruto frowned.
Goldfish scooping was usually only offered at summer festivals. Winter was too cold for those stalls to open.
Besides, he hadn't seen any goldfish-scooping stalls on his way here...
But beyond that, the careless parents could offer no useful clues.
They could only tug at their hair in anguish and regret, pinning their hopes on the police officers stationed nearby.
She vanished into thin air in the middle of the street?
That's absurd. If a demon was behind this, he must have some way to take these children from their parents without anyone noticing.
But there's nothing strange around here... wait.
He narrowed his eyes at the roof of a roadside stall.