4
Naruto can't exactly name the smell that strikes him as he strolls into Grandpa Daigo's Most Wonderful Traveler's Rest. A kind of metallic funk, as if copper has found some way to go rancid. Under it are hints of candle wax, rotten fruit, gunpowder, and . . . something. Naruto sniffs. It's something else entirely. Something weirdly familiar.
He has little time to ponder the issue, attention snapping to the strange chaos of the shop unfolding about him. Stacks of square black prospecting pans lay about nearly every surface. Rugs of crimson and aqua and gold tumble about one another in the corners. Reams of paper and vellum share shelf space with bottles promising the cure for hemorrhoids. Old appliances glower from mismatched piles. Crates of all shapes and sizes seem to make up the entire back wall of the place.
Scattered about the clapboard walls are a series of small, strange lamps. Each is a glass orb about the size of a handball, set into a brass casement. Every one of them casts a halo of blue-green light. The quivering, elongated shadows they summon set Naruto's teeth on edge.
Even as the shopkeeper scuttles deeper into his domain, Naruto stops in his tracks and leans closer to examine the closest of the lamps. Upon further examination, Naruto finds that each globe contains a single jet of flame, which rises from the sconce itself. A bit like oil lamps, then.
. . . Except oil lamps don't burn the color of carnival sweets. Nor do they smell vaguely of . . . well. He can't exactly put his finger on it. That something, familiar and yet damnably elusive.
"Weird," Naruto says.
"Ah," the shopkeeper says. "These are new to you, yes?" The little man's voice is a growling croak, so rough it sounds as if he started smoking in childhood. On reflection, this seems likely.
Smiling like an oni, the shopkeeper leaps over the to the lamp, deftly unscrews its glass casing, and sticks his hand into the flame. He turns his gnarled digits through the oddly colored fire. Even after some thirty seconds, nothing happens to the man's liver-spotted hand.
Naruto nods calmly. "So. Cold fire. Neat."
"We call it 'ghost flame' round these parts," the shopkeeper says. He gently sets the globe in its casing. "One o' the many advantages of livin' in the shadow o' Dokusei."
Naruto starts. The sudden spasm shakes a fine misting of dust off his coat. "You just said 'Tokusei,' right?"
The shopkeeper's face reddens. "Oh! Uh. Yes, as it were. That was just a bit of a local joke."
"Really."
"Well, you know. I guess some of the local lads figured out how easy it is to mix 'Tokusei' up with 'Dokusei,' especially when they've been drinkin'," the little man says. "Don't really mean nothin'."
"That's . . . interesting," Naruto says.
Dokusei. Toxic. Virulent. That certainly bodes well.
Whatever. Fuck knows why the town founders chose "Tokusei" anyway. You can read it a half-dozen ways, and yeah, "good fortune" is one of them, but . . .
"Anyway!" Naruto says decisively. He shakes his head, dust raining off the brim of his hat. No time to dawdle. "That's great. Exactly where I'm headed. So—tell me what you know about the place."