Pathway to Japanese Literature

Factory

It was the frosty morning of an iron foundry growing solemnly bright.

It was the hour when the great crucible that had burned coke continuously for two or three days had ripened completely like a sunset within the foundry's dimness. Beneath the yellow electric light, the needle of the boiler's pressure gauge continued its silent shudder, poised to surpass two hundred degrees—these were the minutes of such tension. In a single moment, an underground silence of a thousand feet permeated the entirety of the pitch-black, soot-covered factory. ...That moment of piercing silence hinted at an immeasurable, ominous premonition... as if this factory might burst at any moment...

I calmly re-crossed my arms. While sneering deep within my heart at the premonition of such a preposterous, unimaginable event, I looked up at the high ceiling's skylight. From there, I looked up diagonally at the smokestack belching black smoke against the distant blue sky. While half of that diagonally tilted smokestack shone distinctly with the olive hue of the rising sun, I felt a dizzying illusion that it might collapse onto my head at any moment, and violently shook my head from side to side.

I—due to my father’s sudden death—had been made to inherit this factory while still fresh from university and completely inexperienced… And just now, I had been dragged out here to command my first practical operation. While being made to anticipate the workers’ insults and scorn toward their young, novice master… However, my defiant spirit had forced all those ominous premonitions into the deepest pit of my gut. With an air of proud nonchalance, I clenched a bat sideways between my teeth and surveyed the white breaths of workers stationed at their posts.

Before my eyes, a massive flywheel glinted like a black rainbow, smiling brightly. In the darkness beyond that—the lingering dark since last night—gears of all sizes, countless in number, endlessly gnashed their teeth together. The piston rod thrust out its gray arm smoothly… The hydraulic riveting machine stared up at the darkness of the ceiling space…

The Steam Hammer had lifted one leg while... ...everything had braced itself at 100 percent for both the supernatural colossal horsepower and the conviction born of physical principles, awaiting my single command while remaining utterly silent. ...Was that shh——ii... sound coming from nowhere—the hiss of steam escaping the safety valve’s lip... or merely a ringing in the depths of my ears...? A force coursed through my spine. My right hand rose high of its own accord.

The foreman nodded and left. ...With excruciating slowness... gradually... all the interlocking machines within the factory began to awaken. Steam had begun to spread to every corner of the factory. And then gradually, increasingly faster... until finally, iron phantasms too swift for the eye to catch erupted simultaneously in a swirling vortex around me. ...Humans... madmen... supermen... beasts... predators... monsters... behemoths... A roar of iron that scoffed at the combined might of them all—pitch-black, merciless groans that would not rest until they had lured every great spirit into illusions of terror and death in an instant rolled and tumbled everywhere.

A sound mocked the ghosts of female workers and child laborers—countless ones torn apart, sliced to shreds, beaten down... The voice reviled the old worker’s skull that had been smashed to pieces the other day… The sound mocked both legs of the large man whose limbs had been crushed long ago… A hellish noise coldly observed all life, disregarded it, and engrossed itself in the fierce battle between iron and fire… The choking shriek of the circular saw from the distant wood factory traveled from the nape of the neck to the base of the ears, seeping into each and every strand of hair and trembling. That sound too had severed several fingers, an arm, and a young man’s forehead. The blood splatter still remained darkened on the beam’s midsection.

My father had been branded a madman by society. This was because he had been an uneducated, grotesque old laborer who - once he began work - would toil ceaselessly day and night with steely eyes glinting devoid of blood or tears. That reality had become both this factory's crucifix and its pride, while simultaneously constituting an unending threat to dozens of ironworks. Thus there existed not a single machine within these walls that hadn't claimed either some human limb or life itself. The pitch-dark walls and every ceiling corner were steeped in bloody screams and cold derision. Such was the workers' fervor in this factory. Such was the machines' resolve in this factory.

Moreover, to control all of these—iron, blood, flesh, and soul—despising them without exception, making them clash and curse each other like dead leaves… and thereby creating anew a great iron sneer… That was my father’s dying wish. ……And wasn’t that also a satisfaction at which I should have smiled…….

“Nah.” “I’ll show them.” “Child’s play…”

I started walking leisurely with my arms crossed. Still thinking how many more living souls I might yet cast as iron's prey... while accustoming my ears to the entire factory's absurdly solemn screams, great screams... I carried on smiling at fantasies steeped in cruelty—the pinnacle of my pride... "Gah!" "Boss! Oh!"

A shriek closer to a scream arose behind me. “…Another one got got…”

Every nerve in my body sharpened in that instant. As I slowly turned around, a sun-colored crucible suspended by a crane loomed before my nose—its surface studded with white sparks that glittered as it swayed and pressed closer. Poised to incinerate anything it touched... My vision blurred. I crushed the Pompu casting mold beneath my feet and recoiled. With every drop of blood concentrated in my heart, I slammed against the wood factory door and stood frozen.

Five or six foundry workers came running up before me. They bobbed their heads while apologizing for their carelessness.

While looking around at their faces, I stood there with my mouth agape… I felt the cold air stinging the minor burns on my forehead, cheeks, and the bridge of my nose… And I heard every sound throughout the factory laughing mockingly… “Ehehehehehehehehe” “Ohohohohohohohoho” “Hihihihihihihihi” “Hahahahahahahahaha” “Huhuhuhuhuhuhuhu” “Gerageragerageragera”

“Garagaragaragaragara”

“Gorogorogorogorogoro” “...Serves you right...”

Sky

The single-wing reconnaissance plane marked with the number T11 began ascending at a remarkable steep angle, kicking away the green fields and mountains. “...Hey….” “Lieutenant Y.” “Stop that No. 11 monoplane.” “Since you’ve just been transferred here, you probably don’t know this—it’s had its crew vanish mid-air twice already.” “What’s more, both times only the aircraft came down—miraculously without a scratch. It’s a cursed machine with that kind of history.” “The engine and airframe are still perfectly sound, but since everyone refuses to fly it, we had it stored away in the attic... Stop him! Stop him...”

The commander's warning words and the anxious faces of my colleagues who saw me off rapidly faded beneath the stratocumulus clouds like events from a bygone century. And soon above my head, the summer sky—drenched and gleaming in the fresh morning sun—spread out blue upon blue, endlessly.

I was proud.

I, who had resolved to trust nothing but my precise inspection capabilities regarding every part of the aircraft, my acute weather observation skills, and my experience of breaking through all manner of dangers, had taken this steep upward angle out of simple antipathy toward the commander and colleagues' superstitious concerns. ……How could I go to war like this…… I began to feel…… But……even such resentment vanished without a trace as I broke through a corner of the coldly creeping stratocumulus clouds. And then, all that remained was the altimeter showing 2,500 meters, the strangely quiet hum of the propeller, and the spark's flawless inspiration.

...This T11 was damn fine... ...Even though it had already passed three hundred kilometers—what was with this silence…

...And on a day like this, there shouldn't be any air pockets... If not for these stratocumulus clouds, I'd show them some real high-altitude flying right here—that'd knock their socks off... As I kept puzzling over this while gently pulling up on the controls, I suddenly spotted eleven shadows gliding across the cloud layer two to three hundred meters below my feet, rising and falling in unison as they slid along. Seeing this, even a seasoned flier like me couldn't help feeling an indescribable thrill. There in the heart of the boundless sky, I found myself savoring that crystal-clear satisfaction known only to sky conquerors. ...So utterly childlike... This pounding in my chest...

……2,500 meters altitude……. ……The hum of the quiet propeller……. ……the spark's ineffably perfect inspiration…… Hot tears that had forgotten everything oozed from my eyes. Tears of emotion flying solitary between sun, azure sky, and clouds… To suppress them, I blinked two-three times behind my glasses.

……It was that moment……. From within the vast, mirror-like blue sky glinting brightly right before the propeller, a small airplane appeared and began steadily growing in size…

I found it strange. I thought it might be an optical illusion given how sudden it was, but even as I did, the black shadow ahead steadily grew larger until it revealed itself as a distinct single-wing aircraft. Bracing myself, I tightened my grip on the control stick. ......2,500 meters altitude...... ……The hum of the quiet propeller……. ...the ineffably perfect inspiration of the spark...

I was startled. I held my breath and widened my eyes. Approaching from ahead was a land-based reconnaissance aircraft identical down to the last rivet to my own plane. The crew member too appeared to be alone. Though of course I couldn't make out its markings or numbers...

......2,500 meters altitude......

...The quiet propeller.... ...the perfect spark...

……Blue sky……. ……Sun……. ……A sea of stratocumulus clouds……. I gasped.

As I yanked the control stick hard left to evade, simultaneously the opposing aircraft banked wide—revealing its shadowed left flank—only to realign directly at me. Cold sweat erupted across my skin. ...While mentally dismissing this absurdity, I jerked the plane right—the duplicate mirrored my move, its right side blazing sunlight—still charging head-on. ...Precisely like mirror reflections... Every nerve locked rigid. My teeth began chattering violently.

At that moment, my aircraft seemed to hit a slight air pocket and swayed unsteadily as it tilted forward. ...At the same instant, the opposing aircraft also swayed unsteadily and tilted forward—but in that split second, I could unmistakably read the markings on the other plane...T11...

No sooner had I thought this than both wings—righted simultaneously with mine—the opposing aircraft came charging straight toward me head-on—!

……I cut the switch. ……I undid the belt.

……I leapt from the seat. ……I fell about a hundred meters without opening my parachute. The figure of my mirror image fell bullet-like without opening its parachute in the same posture as me... while it stared into the face identical to my own...

……An endless blue sky……. ……Dazzling sun…….

...A sea of stratocumulus clouds glowing yellow....

Street

The depths of midnight in Greater Tokyo...

After exhausting myself at the club, I was trudging home alone with my head hung low when I suddenly looked up. As the entire area around me flared up brightly...

……At that corrugated iron clang—a siren’s wail that seemed to leap skyward—I gasped in shock and tried to recoil, but before I could move, an automobile overtook me like a whirlwind. ……A dust cloud swirled up in its wake……the stench of gasoline……the number 4444 and its red lamp rapidly shrinking smaller and smaller into the distance……. Huh... Wasn't that automobile's owner a doll... The profile was far too beautiful. I couldn’t clearly make out her kimono, but her hair was bound like cascading water, her face powdered chalk-white, rigidly composed under the green light… Her obsidian eyes opened wide, holding a faint smile as she stared fixedly ahead alongside the driver. The way she arched her back with that artificial poise seemed so thoroughly doll-like... Just as I thought this, another automobile approached from behind.

I immediately turned to look back. The owner of that automobile was a gentleman wearing a Panama hat. A ruddy-faced, imposingly portly man—the very model of wealth—sat with both hands firmly planted on his knees, maintaining that slightly arched posture as he stared fixedly straight ahead alongside the driver, gliding soundlessly past me. The automobile's number was 11111... ...Dolls. They're dolls. That gentleman was unquestionably a doll... Huh... This isn't right...

As I was thinking this, I again stared intently into the interior of an approaching automobile while remaining stone-stiff.

......This time it was a monk wearing a brocade priestly robe. A young, refined doll resembling a noble prince—with a straight nose—slightly lowered its eyes and glided smoothly past, hands pressed together in prayer. I shuddered violently. The surroundings were deserted streets……the great sky filled with stars……. ……The eerie phenomenon of midnight Tokyo……that I alone witnessed……. I felt some indescribable, ominous, enormous and terrifying thing closing in around me. I started walking briskly to get home as soon as possible.

At that moment, two automobiles approached soundlessly from both in front of and behind me.

……Myself and……. ……My dream’s……. ……The figure from the wedding day…….

I ran away. I rushed into the club entrance and collapsed onto the mat.

“Help me!”

Hospital

Before I knew it, I had been placed inside a sturdy iron cage. I had been dressed in a white muslin patient gown, bound with a gauze bandage, and was sprawled out spread-eagled in the center of the concrete floor. ......This appeared to be a mental hospital. Yet I felt no surprise. Without making a sound, I kept thinking intently. Once I understood this was a mental hospital, making a commotion would prove futile. The more disturbance I caused, the crueler my treatment would become—this truth stood absolute. Besides, it was now midnight. Though seemingly a sizable hospital, not a single murmur reached my ears. ......I mustn't make noise. Mustn't rage. No—no. Neither tears nor laughter. For they'd only deem me further mad......

I deliberately repositioned myself to sit in the center of the concrete floor. I placed both hands neatly on my knees, assumed a meditative posture, half-opened my eyes, and gazed fixedly at the base of the iron bars lining the cage. With the intention of calming my nerves... Sure enough, my nerves grew steadily calmer. The entire hospital fell completely silent from corner to corner...

That was when. From beyond the iron cage I faced, someone approached in measured steps. The figure appeared to be a young man wearing a white examination gown who, moving along the wooden corridor—about a foot higher than the concrete floor where I sat—approached with slow, contemplative steps that clacked rhythmically against the boards until reaching the front of my cage where he stopped dead. With both hands still thrust into his pockets as he seemed to gaze steadily down at me, the neatly aligned toes of his slipper-shoes remained motionless beneath my lowered eyelids.

I slowly raised my face. Into my field of vision first came striped trousers with taut knees and an examination gown stained with ink... Yet... These were striped trousers and a gown I had surely seen somewhere before... Thinking this, I closed my eyes briefly to ponder... But soon I realized with a start. I opened my eyes wide and perfectly round and looked up at that face.

It was the face I had expected. ...pale and emaciated... hair tousled into disarray... unkempt beard growing wild and bushy... gloomy black eyes cast downward... resembling a suffering Christ... That was me... Undoubtedly me who had once studied in this hospital's medical office.

My chest began pounding violently—thump thump thump thump—for a spell. And then again thud thud thud… tap tap tap tap—it gradually subsided. The galaxy flowing above the enormous building behind the white examination gown suddenly glared with remembered intensity.

At that very moment... I felt all my questions had been resolved. The one who had made me a mental patient and confined me to this cage was indeed myself in the examination gown standing beyond these iron bars. This me in the examination gown must have developed a mental abnormality from excessively researching his own brain, leading him to mistake himself and confine this version of me here. "If only this 'me in the examination gown' weren't here, I would not have been treated as a madman like this."

As soon as I realized this, I involuntarily flared up. Forgetting myself, I glared at the face of the me outside the iron cage and shouted.

“...What are you here for... You...” That voice created a loud echo that spun through the entire hospital before fading away. However, the me outside did not change expression in the slightest. With both hands still thrust into the pockets of his examination gown, continuing to look down with that Christ-like melancholy gaze, **the me outside** answered in a quiet, clear voice.

“I came to visit you.” I finally flared up completely. “...There’s no need for you to come visit.” “You damn idiot... Get out of here.” “...and go study your own work...” As I listened to the echo of my own rough voice, I felt the corners of my eyes grow searingly hot... though I knew not why... Yet the me outside seemed to grow ever calmer, a faint sneer forming at the edge of those thin lips.

“Watching you like this is my research.” “The moment you completely lose your mind is when my research reaches completion.” “...Though I’d say it’s already reached that stage...” “You... You inhuman monster.” “Y-You... You’re going to t-toy with me and k-kill me... Y-Y-You cold-blooded bastard...” “Science is always cold-blooded... Hah...”

The man bared his white teeth and laughed. He suddenly looked up at the sky... as if to howl... I became frantic. I abruptly stood up and thrust both hands out from inside the cage. I grabbed the collar of the man’s white examination gown and twisted violently. “S...sa... Let me out... Get me out... From this cage... Then we can complete the research together... Right?... Right?... I'm begging you...” I involuntarily choked on hot tears. I let several salty streams flow down into the back of my throat.

Yet the me in the examination gown neither resisted nor tried to escape. And while being jostled by me in patient garb, he said with apparent pain: “N-no... c-can’t... You’re... my precious... research subject... Can’t let you out... of here...”

“Wh-... Wha-... What did you say...” “If I let you out… here… the experiment won’t function…”

I involuntarily loosened my grip. Instead, I pulled the man’s face close to the tip of my nose and peered so intensely it might bore a hole. “What did you say?!” “Say it one more time.” “No matter how many times I say it, it’s the same thing.” “I must confine you within this cage and make you completely lose your mind.” “That progress report will become my doctoral thesis.” “...beneficial for the nation and society...” “...Huh... Go ahead... do whatever the hell you want...”

Before I could finish speaking, I grabbed the man’s disheveled hair. I delivered a blow between his eyes and nose. Then, with his nosebleed dripping pathetically, I mustered all my strength to shove his limp body away, sending it crashing with a tremendous thud that echoed endlessly through the midnight corridor. He lay there motionless, as if dead. “Ha ha ha... Look at you now... Ah ha ha ha ha!”

Seven Stalks of Seaweed

Beneath a cloudy sky, into the gloomy depths of a leaden sea, I sank quietly, quietly downward. Having received orders from the authorities to confirm the whereabouts of the Oorath Maru—the ship that sank loaded with gold coins—... The pressure inside the diving suit gradually, gradually increased, and the base of my ears began ringing with an Eeeeeeeeng sound. Next, my heart palpitations began reverberating inside my skull, accompanied by thud-thud, thump-thump noises. As this happened, the surrounding silence seemed to grow ever deeper… .

……It was as if a temple bell were tolling somewhere far off…….

Fragments of grey seaweed slid smoothly upward. Following that, a school of small grey fish disappeared upward, maintaining their orderly formation. My vision gradually began to darken. When true darkness finally fell—so profound that pinching my nose brought no sensation—my heavy soles seemed to settle softly upon the seabed mud. I pulled the signal rope to inform my comrades on the surface. I began walking slowly, ever so slowly, guided by the light from the lamp attached to my diving helmet. I crossed countless perfectly round, gently sloping grey sand dunes.

But no matter how far I walked, there were only the same low, round sand dunes, and no matter how far I gazed, not a trace of a ship's shadow—let alone a single seashell—could be found. ...Moreover, as I walked on for some time, I noticed the entire area had imperceptibly grown dimmer, becoming filled with a pale, phosphorescent glow. ...Like twilight in a desert... Like being on the path to the realm of the dead... Uncertain... Ominous....

I quietly began to turn around. I had a vague premonition that some ominous event awaited me on my path… But before I had even turned halfway, my entire body jerked rigid.

Right behind me—so close I could almost touch it with my nose—a forest of seaweed materialized without warning, its unfathomably strange shapes looming against endless undulating sand dunes. ...The seaweed forest... Each stalk measured between five or six feet to about ten feet in length. Their perfectly round heads formed oval shapes like sargassum... From their constricted bases, thin cords connected them to the seabed. They stood vertical like grave markers, some aligned and others overlapping. In the pale phosphorescent glow, they appeared jet-black and stark... When I counted, there were seven in total.

I stood dumbfounded. First, with my heart pounding thump-thump, I slowly took two or three steps backward.

Then, from within the cluster of gigantic seaweed—specifically from the nearest stalk—a human voice leaked out.

It was a low, raspy voice.

“Hellooo...” I felt each bone in my body freeze solid like ice. At the same time—still unaware of the voice’s origin yet gripped by a sensation of having encountered some unimaginably terrifying specter—I kept inching backward. Then again, from an eight-foot seaweed stalk to my right, a muffled, languid voice drifted over. “...You... came searching for the gold coins, didn’t you?”

My heart palpitations suddenly surged again. Then they suddenly grew quiet and stopped moving entirely. ...aware that I was being stared at by something indescribably terrifying—something beyond any yōkai—...

Then again, from the shortest stalk positioned farthest away, a sad, gentle woman’s voice slowly drifted out. “We are not yōkai.” “The corpses of the Oorath Maru’s captain and wife… one young girl… one driver… and three sailors that you’ve been searching for.” “…The one who just spoke to you was the captain, and I am his wife.” “You understand now…” “And the very first one who called out to you was the chief driver.”

“...You ain’t listenin’.” “Listen… we three were all allies of the Oorath Maru’s captain.”

A rusted, sunken voice spoke up. “...So we got beat to death by that pack of subhumans from the Oorath Maru’s crew—canvas sacks yanked over our heads, smothered in cement and tar, weights lashed to our legs, turned into fish feed in the end.” “……………”

“And then… those other bastards went and scattered ship fragments across the waves to fake a sinking, all while covering up their tracks.”

“……………” “...And that bastard who became the ringleader even went back home on purpose to lie to the cops in his hometown.” “Putting on airs like he was the only one who survived… then went around spreading lies about the ship sinking here…” “It’s true. Sir... That person strangled me right before my father and mother.” “You know full well, don’t you, Sir?”

That lovely, sad voice of a young girl was heard last of all. It must have leaked out from the shortest sack at the center of the seven... After that, everything fell completely silent, and only the sound of sniffling sobs seeped through the seawater.

I stood frozen in place, unable to move. My consciousness gradually began slipping away. I no longer had even the strength to pull the signal cord... I was that very chief sailor—the instigator... ...Somewhere, something like a temple bell tolled...

Glass World

The world was made of glass to its very edge. Rivers and seas—of course—as well as towns, houses, bridges, trees lining the streets, forests, and mountains were all as transparent as crystal.

With skates laced tight, I glided straight along the glass-paved road that pierced through the heart of this landscape all the way to the horizon... onward... ever onward... Far behind me rose a towering building whose single room shone blood-red through its transparent walls - visible with crystalline clarity no matter how many times I turned to look. Over houses, across bridges, through tree-lined streets... every structure made entirely of glass...

I had just killed a woman in that room. However, a certain renowned detective who had been observing my actions from atop a distant police tower—the moment he saw that room turn crimson from my violent act—immediately donned skates identical to mine and glided out from the police station’s entrance toward me. Employing skating’s arcane techniques… straight as an arrow loosed from its string— The moment he saw that, I too desperately fled. In the same way, employing skating’s arcane techniques… straight as an arrow…

Under the blue, blue sky... along the glinting infinite glass road, both the pursuing detective and fleeing me saw through each other completely... in this suffocating state where not even a midge could hide its form...

The detective gradually increased his speed. So I too desperately dug in my toes... While feeling the acceleration from my head start rapidly widening the distance between us with each passing moment...

I turned backward while gliding and spread out my right hand. I pressed my thumb to the tip of my nose and taunted the detective chasing from afar with my fingertip, hurling insults at him.

I could clearly see from afar how the detective's face was rapidly turning crimson. He was likely gritting his teeth in bitter frustration. The sight of him flailing his arms like a drowning man while desperately kicking up the glass pavement was utterly absurd... Serves you right... I thought—yet fearing he might catch me if I let my guard down, I spun around at a random spot... Then I froze. Before I knew it, I had reached the horizon's edge. ...Beneath my feet lay an infinite void.

I panicked. I tried desperately to hold my ground. In that moment, my foot slipped, and I slammed my body onto the glass-paved road. Desperately thrusting out my bloodied hands to brace myself, I tried to stop—but the inertia from all my previous sliding refused to comply. My body slid straight out over the edge of the horizon and tumbled upside down into infinite space. I gritted my teeth. I clutched at the void. I thrashed my limbs wildly in all directions. But I couldn't grasp anything at all.

At that moment, from the sharply cut edge of the horizon, the detective’s face popped into view. While looking down at my falling face, he bared a full row of white teeth.

“Do you get it now…? Driving you out of the glass world was my goal all along!”

……………

Having realized I had been measured for the first time, I pressed both hands to my face in bitter frustration. Wailing at the top of my voice, I fell endlessly through infinite space... on and on and on...