Volume 1/The Ostentatious Emerada

## The Ostentatious Emerada

**The Ostentatious Emerada** (虚飾のエメラダ, *Kyoshoku no Emerada*?) is the first chapter of *Hanabishi Fusai no Taima-Chou* Volume 1.

## Summary

Suzuko Takigawa has the ability to see ghosts and a hobby of visiting other nobility to collect ghost stories. On one visit, she sees a female ghost with a slit throat about to attack Viscountess Murotsuji with a shamisen plectrum, but she is quickly consumed by another female ghost dressed in juunihitoe and surrounded by a distinctive fragrance. The ghost then dissolves into smoke and drifts towards a young man. As Suzuko prepares to leave the Murotsuji estate, the young man comes up to her and introduces himself as Baron Takafuyu Hanabishi, who had been called here to perform a purification rite. He reveals that he knows Suzuko could see the juunihitoe ghost and asks her to marry him. Suzuko immediately turns him down.

A few days later, Suzuko learns from her father's mistress, Chizu, that Takafuyu had approached her aunt to have her help with his marriage proposal. Chizu tries to encourage her to accept the proposal by talking about Takafuyu's good looks and wealth as well as the Hanabishi family's long and venerable history as the chief priests of a shrine on Awaji Island. She encourages Suzuko to go see the beautiful Hanabishi estate in Kojimachi. Wanting to get some more explanation from Takafuyu, Suzuko decides to go, taking her attendant Taka with her.

At the mansion, Takafuyu leads Suzuko to a room with an incense burner. He explains the Hanabishi family's history with the juunihitoe ghost, Awaji no Kimi, and how the family must feed ghosts to her or else they would be cursed to die. Takafuyu claims that that was what happened to his parents, grandfather, and older brother. Awaji no Kimi chooses the bride of the family head, and since Suzuko could smell her scent, that means she was chosen. He reveals that he investigated her background and knows about her past as the Clairvoyant Girl of Asakusa, and the massacre of the people she lived with in the Asakusa slums after she mysteriously disappeared six years ago. Takafuyu uses this information to compel Suzuko to marry him, or else he would leak it to the public and cause a big scandal. Suzuko has no choice but to agree.

After this, the Takigawa family prepares for Suzuko's marriage. Suzuko's half-sisters, Yukiko and Asako, come to the estate to help her with her trousseau. Her half-brothers, Yoshitada and Yoshimi, also visit. Yoshimi disapproves of the marriage because he finds Takafuyu and the Hanabishi family suspicious. He talks about how three successive generations of the family died, and how Takafuyu, who was adopted out a merchant's family, came back to inherit the baron title. The conversation shifts to the popularity of synthetic gemstones and birthstones even among nobles. Suzuko is reminded of Viscountess Murotsuji's ring and the geisha ghost she saw at her home. Suzuko asks her siblings if there were any recent murders of geishas. Yoshimi remembers seeing a murder of a geisha in Akasaka in the newspapers half a month ago. Suzuko manages to convince Yoshitada to get her the newspaper from that time.

According to the newspaper, a geisha named Koman was found with her throat slit in her ransacked room. It is assumed to be a robbery. Suzuko persuades Yoshitada to contact his schoolmate who works in the police department to get more information about the case. She learns that Koman, real name Yamai Kane, worked at a small geisha parlor in Akasaka and was found dead in her ransacked room by the proprietress and other geishas after they returned home from a flower viewing. Kane's entire village had died from the recent epidemic. Suzuko thinks about the ghost she saw at the Murotsuji estate and wonders if she was Kane. She decides to visit the geisha parlor, accompanied by Taka.

On the way there, she meets up with Takafuyu, who already knew her destination. At the parlor, they meet Kotatsu, another geisha working there. Kotatsu tells them about Koman. Koman had come to Tokyo from a small mountain village to make money to support her entire village. After she got the news that her entire village was killed by the flu, Koman fell into a deep depression and seemed to be planning to commit suicide. Viscount Murotsuji consoled her and gave her an emerada ring, which Koman believes was the only thing stolen by the robber who ransacked her room. Kotatsu recalls hearing her talk about selling the ring to pay for her cremation. Suzuko remembers seeing a ring that fits the description on Viscountess Murotsuji's finger. Takafuyu gets Kotatsu to admit that she had actually come home before the others and was the first person to find Koman's body. Kotatsu found her with her plectrum in her hand and her throat slit. Not wanting the parlor to become the centre of a scandal, she threw the plectrum away before reporting the death to the police. Kotatsu breaks down into tears because she is worried that she would get into trouble with the police because she tampered with a crime scene. Suzuko takes pity on her and tells Taka to bring her to the mansion and explain the situation to Yoshitada.

After leaving the parlor, Suzuko decides to go to the Murotsuji estate again. Though Koman's ghost is now gone, she wants to chase after the vestiges of those who are dead and know what they left behind in the world by staying. At the mansion, they meet Viscount Murotsuji. They tell him that the ghost was Koman, who was fixated on his wife's ring, which was actually the one he gave to Koman. The viscount confesses that his wife found out about the ring. Since the Murotsujis aren't wealthy, he had to lie to the steward that he was buying the ring as a necessary expense for socializing with the nobility, and then lied to the store clerks that it was a gift for his wife. After his wife found out that he gave the ring to a geisha, she demanded that he get it back right away, so the viscount went to Koman and told her the truth. Koman wouldn't give it back to him unless he gave her the money he paid for it in exchange, but the viscount had no money with him and told her that he would give it to her later. Koman believed him and gave the ring back, but not before telling him that he must give her the money or she'll come and take the ring back. However, she died soon afterwards and the haunting started some time later. Suzuko and Takafuyu leave the estate.

Suzuko theorizes that Koman appeared at the estate because she had come to take the ring back, just as she said she would. She thinks that Koman was exasperated by the nobility's desperate need to keep up appearances and their inability to see the people below them as equals. The two walk to Hie Shrine, where Takafuyu talks about how faith changes throughout the years, yet remains the same despite outside forces trying to standardize it. Takafuyu learned this from his older brother, who was the heir to the family before he passed away and studied Shinto seriously. He asks her about her gloves. Suzuko always wears gloves in order to cover the burn scar on her hand, which she had since childhood. Takafuyu admits to her that he is actually the child of his grandfather, not his father. His grandfather and father had a dispute over religious matters, and so his grandfather decided to disown his father by conceiving a new child, who was Takafuyu. On paper, Takafuyu is the son of his father and mother. His grandfather heavily favored him, while his parents hated him, though his grandfather was kind to him. After his grandfather died, Takafuyu was sent out to be adopted by relatives in Yokohama. His parents later died by drowning, and his brother died from illness. So Takafuyu ended up taking over the Hanabishi family.

Suzuko realizes that Takafuyu told her about his painful past in order to convey to her that he could understand her feelings. She tells him that in exchange for marrying him, she wants him to help her find a noble who uses the pine as his personal emblem. Suzuko's true motive behind collecting ghost stories from the nobility was to visit their houses in order to investigate them. She confirms that everything Takafuyu said about her past was true. The people who took care of her in Asakusa--Ginroku, Tei, and Torakichi--were murdered. On that day, she had been summoned to the Takigawa estate by her grandfather after a servant spotted her and found that she resembled her father. Her grandfather asked her to live at the mansion, but Suzuko couldn't immediately answer him and left. But on her way home, the bloodied and beaten ghosts of her family members appeared in her path, telling her to return to the Takigawa estate. Ginroku told her that their murderer was a noble because he was carrying a handkerchief with a pine emblem, and that she must become a noble's daughter and find their murderer. Takafuyu thinks that they gave her that purpose in order to keep her safe and prevent her from dwelling on their deaths afterwards. He embraces Suzuko as she cries.

Takafuyu returns home after walking Suzuko back to her home. His servants treat him coldly because most of them sided with his parents against his grandfather. Takafuyu had lied to Suzuko about his brother Saneaki's death. Saneaki had actually strangled himself to death, but the death was recorded as an illness. Takafuyu didn't know why he committed suicide. He goes through his brother's things and finds his brother's handkerchiefs embroidered with a pine emblem. He is in disbelief at first, but as he considers the fact that his brother had died after Suzuko's family was murdered, he is no longer sure of anything.

## Characters

* Viscountess Murotsuji
* Suzuko Takigawa
* Kane Yamai (ghost)
* Awaji no Kimi
* Takafuyu Hanabishi
* Marquis Takigawa (mentioned)
* Previous Marquis Takigawa (mentioned)
* Suzuko's mother (mentioned)
* Chizu
* Aunt in Azabu (mentioned)
* Taka
* Kirino (mentioned)
* Yura
* Takami Hanabishi (mentioned)
* Harumi Hanabishi (mentioned)
* Yoshino Hanabishi (mentioned)
* Yukiko
* Asako
* Yoshitada Takigawa
* Yoshimi Takigawa
* Ofuku (mentioned)
* Tsurumi (mentioned)
* Kotatsu
* Viscount Murotsuji
* Ginroku (mentioned)
* Tei (mentioned)
* Torakichi (mentioned)
* Saneaki Hanabishi (mentioned)