Pathway to Japanese Literature

Opening Poem Fetus,

Fetus, Why do you leap? You understand your mother's heart, Are you frightened? …………Buuuuuuuuuuuun………………nuuuuuuuuuun……………….

When I groggily opened my eyes, this sound resembling the drone of bees still lingered clearly within my ear canals, its elastic reverberations deeply embedded. As I kept listening intently to that... I intuitively realized it was midnight. And so I thought... there must be a bonging clock somewhere nearby... As I kept drifting in and out of consciousness, those lingering echoes resembling a bee's drone gradually faded away one after another until everything settled into a hushed stillness.

I snapped my eyes open.

From the fairly high, white-painted ceiling cavity hung a single naked bulb shrouded in pallid dust. On the amber-glowing glass sphere's flank perched a large fly, deathly still. On the hard, cold artificial stone floor directly below, I lay spreadeagled. ......How strange......

I remained rigidly spread-eagled, my eyelids opened to their utmost limit. Then I tried rotating just my eyeballs around and around—up, down, left, right. A room approximately twelve feet square, enclosed by bluish-black concrete walls. On each of those three walls was installed a large vertical ground-glass window fitted with black iron bars and double-layered wire mesh—a room that felt engineered for absolute security. At the base of the wall without windows lay a single cast-iron bed positioned with its head toward the entrance, yet the pristine white bedding spread neatly atop it suggested no one had ever slept there.

……This is really strange…………. I slightly lifted my head and looked around at my own body. Two layers of stiff new white cotton kimono had been put on me, and one short gauze obi was tied high across my chest. The four plump, protruding limbs extending from there were uniformly dusky black and caked with grime... The sheer filthiness of it...

......This grows ever stranger...... Trembling violently, I raised my right hand to feel across my face. ...A sharp nose... hollowed eyes... hair matted into wild disarray... beard grown thick and tangled...

……I bolted upright. Again, I ran my hands over my face. I darted my eyes around.

...Who... I don't recognize this person... The palpitations in my chest surged violently. My heart began pounding like an alarm bell... My breathing turned ragged in response. I gasped so desperately I thought death imminent. Yet everything abruptly stilled again. ...How could such impossibility exist... ...I've forgotten myself... ...No matter how I strain, I can't recall my origin or identity. ...Of my entire past, only one memory persists—the booming resonance of a bonging clock I just heard. ...That alone remains...

……And yet my mind remained clear. I could clearly perceive the deathly silent darkness enveloping the room's exterior, stretching endlessly in every direction…….

……This isn't a dream…… This most certainly isn't a dream………….

I leapt to my feet. I dashed to the window and peered into the flat surface of the ground-glass pane. Looking at my own visage reflected there, I tried to summon some memory. ……But it amounted to nothing. On the surface of the ground-glass pane, only my own shadowy figure—a demon with tangled hair—stared back. I whirled around and dashed to the entrance door at the head of the bed. I pressed my face against the brass fitting where only the keyhole lay exposed. Yet its surface refused to reflect my face. It merely threw back a dim yellow light.

……I frantically searched around the bed legs. I flipped over the bedding. I even untied the obi and turned my kimono inside out, but couldn't find so much as initials, let alone my name. I was stunned. I remained an unknown self in an unknown world. I was a self unknown even to myself. As I pondered this, I began to feel as though I were falling vertically through infinite space somewhere, still dragging the obi behind me. With a shudder welling up from the depths of my viscera, I lost myself and let out a scream.

It was a metallic, absurdly shrill voice... but... before that voice could stir any memory of the past within me, it was swallowed by the surrounding concrete walls and vanished.

Again, I screamed. ……But again, it was futile. After the voice intensely undulated, swirled, and vanished in a fierce surge, only the four walls, three windows, and one door remained solemnly still—their silence deepening with oppressive finality.

Again, I tried to scream. But that voice—stillborn—retreated back into the depths of my throat. The terror of silence deepening with each scream... My back teeth began to chatter. My knees began to tremble of their own accord. And yet I still couldn’t remember who I was…… that suffocating feeling.

Before I knew it, I began gasping. Enveloped in terror—unable to scream though I tried, unable to escape though I struggled—I stood rigidly in the center of the room, gasping.

Is this... a prison... or a psychiatric hospital...? The more I thought this, the more I heard the intensifying sound of my breathing echoing through midnight's four walls like a wintry gale.

Gradually, I began to feel faint. Before my eyes swirled into pitch blackness. My entire body stiffened like a rod, drenched in cold sweat as I nearly toppled backward with a thud. Unconsciously closing my mind’s eye against the fall... or so I thought... yet again I mechanically righted my footing like a machine. I snapped my eyes wide open and stared at the concrete wall across from the bed.

It was because a strange voice had reached my ears from beyond that concrete wall. It was indeed what seemed to be a young woman’s voice. Yet its tone had grown so hoarse it scarcely seemed human—only a sorrowful, painful echo seeped through the concrete wall. “...Dear Brother.” “Dear Brother.” “Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother.” “Once more... let me hear... that voice of yours now... E——h…………”

I recoiled in horror. Involuntarily, I looked back over my shoulder once more. Even though I knew full well there was not a single other person in this room besides myself... I once again stared holes into that section of concrete wall through which the woman’s voice seeped. “...Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother... Dear Brother in the adjacent room... It’s me.” “It is I.” “I was Dear Brother’s betrothed… your future wife was I… It’s me.” “It’s me.” “Please… please let me hear that voice once more… let me hear it… let me… let me E——h… Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother… dearest brother A——h……”

I opened both eyes so wide that my eyelids ached. I opened my lips agape. As if drawn by the voice, I unsteadily took two or three steps forward. And then I firmly pressed down on my lower abdomen with both hands. I continued to glare fixedly at the concrete wall with wide eyes.

That was a scream of monstrously pure passion—one that suspended the listener’s heart in midair. It was a voice of utter desperation—so unbearable it would freeze one’s very viscera to the rock bottom. A voice of sincere, deep-seated grudge—unaware when it had begun calling me… and unaware whether it would continue calling for thousands, tens of thousands of years to come. That from beyond the midnight concrete wall—me? She was calling out to me.

“...Dear Brother... Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother.” “Why… why won’t you answer me?” “It’s me, it’s me, it’s me it’s me.” “Dear Brother… have you forgotten me?” “It is I!” “It’s me!” “I was Dear Brother’s betrothed… It is I… Have you forgotten me?” “……It was on the night before I was to be with Dear Brother… in the midnight hour before our wedding… that I died by Dear Brother’s hand. ……Yet I have fully returned to life… risen from the grave to be here.” “I am neither a ghost nor anything else… Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother.” “……Why won’t you answer me…… Dear Brother… have you forgotten that time……”

I staggered unsteadily backward. Once again, I stared wide-eyed in the direction from which the voice was coming…

...What bizarre words these were. The girl beyond the wall knew me. She claimed to be my betrothed. Moreover, she stated I had killed her with my own hand on the eve of our wedding... and that she herself was a woman resurrected. Thus confined in the room separated from mine by nothing but that single wall, she appeared to call out to me ceaselessly, day and night. All while continuing to shriek these unimaginably bizarre truths, she seemed to keep striving frantically to awaken my past memories.

...Is she a madwoman?

...Is she serious? No, no— She’s a lunatic, a lunatic… Such nonsense… Such an absurd… Ahahaha…

I involuntarily began to laugh, but that laughter froze on my facial muscles and stopped moving. ...An even more anguished, grave voice pierced through the concrete wall once again. Couldn’t even laugh… overflowing with certainty that recognized me as myself… earnest… heartrending…

“...Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother.” “Why won’t you answer me?” “Even though I’m suffering so... Just a single word... Just a single word... Won’t you answer me...” …………………… “...Just a single word... Just a single word... If you would but answer... That’s all I need. ...Then the hospital’s doctors would see... that I’m no madwoman...” “And then… once the director comes to understand that Dear Brother too has come to recognize my voice… that we could leave together… Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother… Why… why won’t you answer me…”

…………………… “...Do you not fathom my torment?... Day upon day... night upon night... does this beseeching voice never reach Dear Brother’s ears?... Ah... Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother... Too merciless... too merciless too merciless... Ah... Ah... I... my voice now...”

As she spoke, yet another distinct new sound began to emanate from beyond the wall. It was unclear whether it was an open palm or a fist, but in any case, it was the sound of a soft, living hand tapping against the concrete wall. It was the sound of a frail woman’s hand—continued knocking with such desperate resolve that she seemed not to care if her skin tore or flesh split. I continued to glare fixedly at that wall with wide eyes and clenched my back teeth, all the while imagining the bloodstains that must have splattered and clung to its other side.

“...Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother... It’s me—the one who died by Dear Brother’s hand.” “And thus I have returned to life.” “I am a pitiful sister with no one else to send word to but Dear Brother.” “I am here all alone… Dear Brother… have you forgotten me?” “Dear Brother… you’re no different.” “In all the world, there are only two of us here.” “And so we’re thought to be mad by others, confined separately in this hospital.”

…………………… “If Dear Brother would but answer... what I say would become the truth.” “If you would but remember me… then they would see… that neither I… nor Dear Brother… are psychiatric patients… Just a single word… Just one thing… If you would but answer… If you would call me… Mayoko… Ah… Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother… Ah… My voice… my eyes… my eyes grow dark…”

I involuntarily leapt onto the bed. I clung to the bluish-black concrete wall where the voice seemed to originate. I wanted to reply immediately… to relieve the girl’s suffering… and above all, to confirm who and what I was as quickly as possible—it was this unbearable impulse that drove me to act. But… I gulped down my saliva again and stopped myself.

I slowly slid down from the bed. While staring fixedly at a single point on that wall, I retreated inch by inch toward the window located directly opposite, trying to put as much distance as possible between myself and that voice. ……I couldn’t respond. No… I shouldn’t have responded. Am I not someone who doesn’t know in the slightest whether she is my wife or not? Am I not someone who, while hearing her heartrendingly pure-hearted cries of such profound anguish, cannot even recall her face? Am I not this world’s most unfathomable dementia patient—one who can recall as a true memory of my past nothing but the clock’s sound I just heard... bwoooon... nnnn...?

How could I, being such a person, possibly respond to her as her husband? Even if answering her were to grant me freedom, there was no guarantee it would reveal my true lineage or indisputable real name... Was I not someone who lacked even the basis to judge whether she was sane or a psychiatric patient...? That wasn’t all.

What if she were indeed a genuine psychiatric patient, and the target of her fervent calls was none other than her own profound hallucination? If I were to carelessly respond, there’s no guarantee it wouldn’t cause a grave mistake. Moreover, what if the person she’s calling out to truly exists in this world—and moreover, that person were someone other than me? Because of my own carelessness, wouldn’t I end up stealing another man’s wife? Tormented by waves of anxiety and terror—that I might be defiling another man’s lover—I gulped down saliva again and again, my hands clenched tightly even as her screams ceaselessly pierced through the wall to assail me head-on.

“Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother.” “It’s too much it’s too much it’s too much it’s too much it’s too much...”

That faint... anguished, ghostly scream of boundless pure-hearted resentment... I grabbed my hair with both hands. With my ten long nails, I scratched and scraped until blood welled up.

“...Dear Brother Dear Brother Dear Brother.” “I am yours.” “I am yours.” “Quickly... quickly, take me into your arms...”

I rubbed my face vigorously with my palms. ......No no... That’s not it, that’s not it. You are mistaken. I don’t know you… ……I was on the verge of shouting out—but then abruptly clamped my mouth shut. This current me who cannot even clearly assert such facts… who knows nothing of my own past… who possesses not a single shred of evidence to refute her words… who remains ignorant of parents, siblings, or birthplace… I… who until this very moment did not even know whether I had been a pig or a human…

I clenched my fist and tapped repeatedly on the bone behind my ear. But from there, no memories surfaced.

Even so, her voice did not cease. Her breath grew ragged... rising to a peak of such profoundly anguished intensity it was nearly impossible to discern. “...Dear Brother... dear brother... please... please save me... save me... ah...”

As if driven by that voice, I once again looked around at the four walls, the window, and the door. I started to dash out but stopped.

……I wanted to flee to a place where I couldn’t hear anything……. As I thought this, my entire body broke out in goosebumps. I ran up to the entrance door and, with all my strength, collided with the flat surface of the blue-painted board that seemed as solid as iron. I peered into the dark keyhole.……Paralyzingly threatened by the relentless noises still echoing through and the scream teetering on collapse……I grabbed the window bars with both hands and shook them with all my might. I finally managed to warp only a lower corner, but beyond that, it seemed impossible to pull it out with human strength.

I dejectedly returned to the center of the room. Shuddering with chattering teeth, I looked around every corner of the room once more.

Am I truly in the human world... Or have I just now crossed into the realm of the dead and am undergoing some form of purgatorial torment?

The moment I regained my sanity in this room—before I could even feel relief—I was assailed by the abyss of self-oblivion... No echoes... Nothing audible but the sound of a clock... No sooner had I thought this than I was plunged into a living hell of unrelenting torment—assailed by the screams of some unknown woman from who-knows-where... An eternal ordeal of tragic love so profound it defied earthly logic—a suffering beyond salvation or escape... I stamped my feet until my heels throbbed... collapsed to the floor... lay on my back... rose up again and scanned the room... To wrench my attention from the adjacent room's fading noises—now barely audible—and the fragmented sobs rising intermittently... To recall my past with desperate urgency... To rescue myself from this agony... To let her hear a definitive response...

In this way, I don’t know whether I ran wild around this room for dozens of minutes… or perhaps hours. Yet my mind remained as empty as ever. Not only had I recalled nothing related to her—I had discovered nothing whatsoever about myself. Within hollow memories dwelled a hollow me. There I was—hounded by her ceaseless screams, flailing blindly in the shadows.

Gradually, the screams of the girl on the other side of the wall weakened. Thinning gradually into a thread-like shrillness, then dissolving into gasping sobs alone, until at last they retreated back into the midnight stillness that had once again reclaimed the four walls. At the same time, I too grew exhausted. Maddened to weariness, wearied from thought. By what I took to be the corridor’s end beyond the door—listening to the steady tick-tock of a large clock—I sank back down, back into that primal unconscious state, unsure whether I stood or sat… when… what… how any of it had come to pass…

……A faint click sounded.

When I came to, I found myself leaning against the corner of the wall opposite the entrance, limbs stretched out before me, head drooped heavily to my chest, staring fixedly at a single point on the artificial stone floor just beyond my nose. When I looked... the floor, window, and walls were now brightly glowing with a pale blue light.

...Chirp-chirp... clank-clank... clank... clickety-clank...

The quiet chirping of sparrows... The sound of a train sliding away into the distance... The ceiling light had gone out without my noticing. ......The night had ended...... Vaguely thinking this, I vigorously rubbed my eyeballs upward with both hands. It must have been because I had slept soundly. I, who had cleanly forgotten the numerous strange and terrifying events that had occurred in the darkness of this morning, resolved to vigorously stretch out my body—now oddly stiff and aching all over—and began to let out a mighty yawn, but before I could fully draw in my breath, I snapped my mouth shut.

Beside the entrance door across the way, a small hatch installed flush with the floor opened, and what appeared to be white dishes and a plain wood tray bearing silver plates began to be pushed in. The moment I saw that, I was jolted. Unconsciously, the numerous doubts that had arisen since this morning must have started churning in my head. ......I stood up, losing all sense of myself. On tiptoe, I rushed to the hatch and bare-handed clamped down on the plump, reddened arm of a woman inserting the plain wood tray. ……And……the tray, toast, plate of vegetable salad, and milk bottle clattered and scattered across the floor.

I strained my hoarse voice. “...Please... please tell me. I... what is my name?” “I... my name... what is my name?” “……………………” She didn’t move a muscle. The cold, radish-like plump upper arm protruding from the white cuff rapidly turned purple beneath both my hands. “...I... my name... what is my name? ...I’m not a madman... not anything...”

“Aaaah—!”

A young woman’s scream erupted from beyond the hatch. The purple arm I had seized began to flail weakly.

“...Someone... someone please come.” “Patient Number Seven... He’s—” “Someone come—!”

“...Shh shh.” “Quietly, quietly… Please be quiet.” “Who am I?” “Where is this... what time is it now... where is this... please... if you tell me... I’ll let go...” ……A wa—ahh… wailing cry erupted. In that instant, the strength in both my hands must have slackened—the woman’s arm slipped free through the hatch, and at once her wailing ceased abruptly, the clattering footsteps of her fleeing down the corridor reaching my ears.

As the arm I’d been desperately clinging to was pulled free, thrown off balance, I landed hard on my backside against the unyielding artificial stone floor. Nearly tumbling over, I caught myself with both hands, then dazedly scanned my surroundings.

Then… yet another strange occurrence unfolded.

The tension that had been strained to its utmost until now slackened as I landed hard on my backside—and with that slackening came an indescribable absurdity welling up from the pit of my stomach, impossible to contain. It was grotesquely absurd beyond endurance—so absurd that every single hair on my head began quivering with this ridiculousness. It was an absurdity welling up from the very depths of the soul, shaking the entire body, surging forth ceaselessly again and again—an absurdity that demanded laughter until bones and flesh were torn asunder, laughter that couldn’t be contained.

……Ah-hahahahaha. Noo, this is ridiculous! What does a name even matter? Even if I forget, it won't inconvenience me at all. I'm still me without a doubt. Ahahahahahaha……….

When I realized this, I could bear it no longer and flung myself onto the floor. I clutched my head, pounded my chest, and thrashed my legs as I laughed. I laughed... I laughed... I laughed. Swallowing tears only to choke on them, twisting my body, writhing and thrashing about as I rolled around laughing. ……Ahahahaha. Could such an absurdity possibly exist? ...Did I fall from heaven? Or spring from the earth? There’s a person here who doesn’t understand Etai. I don't know this person.

Ahahahahahaha…….

...What kind of person had I been—where had I existed and what had I done until now? And what did I intend to do from here onward? I couldn't make heads or tails of any of it. I had only just now, for the first time in my life, become acquainted with such a person. Ahahahahahaha………. ...What in the world was this? What a mysterious thing—what an absurd thing this was. Ah... Ah... So ridiculous... so absurd... Ahahahahahaha…….

……Ah, this is agony. Unbearable. Why am I so absurd like this? Ah-hahahahaha…….

I continued rolling across the artificial stone floor in ceaseless laughter until—whether from my strength for laughter finally exhausting itself—the absurdity abruptly vanished. Then I sat bolt upright. Rubbing my eyeballs and looking closely, I found three pieces of bread, a plate of vegetables, a single fork, and a still-capped milk bottle—remnants of the recent commotion—scattered right at my toes.

When those things caught my eye, I found myself blushing fiercely for no reason at all. Simultaneously realizing I was being gripped by unbearable hunger, I immediately tightened the sash that had fallen nearby and—without pause—thrust out my right hand to seize the lukewarm milk bottle while grabbing butter-slathered toast with my left, beginning to wolf it down. Then I skewered the vegetable salad with my fork, crammed my cheeks full of its unbearably delicious flavor, chomped it messily, and washed it down with great gulps of milk. Having eaten my fill completely, I crawled up onto the bed positioned behind me, flopped down onto fresh sheets, closed my eyes, and stretched out languidly.

After that, I think I dozed off for about fifteen or twenty minutes. Perhaps due to being full, all strength drained from my body—my palms and soles of my feet grew warmly hot as my mind gradually became a dim, hollow cave... Within it, various morning sounds came and went near and far, crossing paths before vanishing... That lassitude... That sense of futility... ……The bustle of the street. The sound of hurried footsteps. The sound of wooden clogs being dragged slowly. A bicycle bell... The sound of someone beating a futon in a distant house...

...In some distant, lofty place, crows cawed raucously... From what seemed a nearby kitchen came the clattering shatter of a cup... Then, just outside the nearest window, a woman's voice suddenly pierced shrilly through... "How vile... Truly now... Though startled... In the thick of it... Such falsehoods... Eheheheheheh..." ...followed immediately by the gurgling of my stomach churning with delight within my abdomen... All these elements melted together, gradually receding into a distant world as I slipped into an entranced dream-state... That pleasantness... That profound gratitude...

......Then, gradually, a single distinct and peculiar sound began to reach me from somewhere far away. It was unmistakably an automobile horn—a peculiarly high-pitched sound that resonated like a large steam whistle: *beep… beep… beepbeepbeepbeep…*. Yet I couldn’t shake the conviction that it carried some terrifying urgency, racing toward my location with desperate purpose. It surged through the morning stillness—*beepbeepbeepbeep*—overpowering and threatening all other sounds as it wove through what seemed like urban intersections, veering this way and that with astonishing speed toward where my head lay resting. Just as it seemed on the verge of plunging into my tangled hair, it abruptly swerved sideways and circled widely. Emitting a high-pitched whine, it crawled along as if retreating about a block away—but soon changed direction again. Screaming at a pitch that seeped into my ear canals, it rushed toward me at breakneck speed before abruptly halting. All sound vanished. At the same time, the entire world fell into profound silence as my sleep grew thick and deep………….

After about five minutes of this pleasant state—lost in thought—the keyhole in the door beside my pillow suddenly snapped sharply. Then the door creaked open heavily with a GIIII—, and sensing something enter with a rustling/scraping noise, I reflexively leapt up and turned around. But... when I focused my eyes and looked closely, I was startled.

Before my eyes, in front of the sturdy door that had been slowly closed, a single small wicker chair had been placed. And before it stood a single astonishingly bizarre figure, towering as though to pierce the clouds while looking down upon me from above.

That was a giant who appeared to stand over six feet tall. His face was as long as a horse’s, and his skin was deathly pale like ceramic. Beneath thin, elongated eyebrows, small bulbous eyes were set close together, their deathly pale pupils—resembling those of a decrepit old man or a terminally ill patient—clouded listlessly within. His nose towered prominently like a foreigner’s, its bridge gleaming with a brilliant white light. Beneath it, the color of the large lips—shut in a straight horizontal line—appeared deathly pale in seamless continuity with the surrounding skin; was this not perhaps due to some terrible illness? Above all, the unnerving sight of his immensely broad forehead—its slope resembling a temple roof—and his massive jaw jutting like a warship’s prow… One could only perceive him as possessing a superhuman, utterly bizarre character. He stood there with glossy black hair parted sharply down the middle, clad in what appeared to be an opulent blackish-brown fur coat. Before the shimmering platinum watch chain swaying beneath it, his slender, pallid, hairy fingers wrung themselves together as he loomed before a delicate wicker chair likely intended for a woman—his entire figure resembling a Western monster conjured by magic or some such sorcery.

I timidly looked up at that figure before me. Like some creature newly hatched from an egg, I held my breath—eyes fluttering incessantly—as my tongue fumbled awkwardly in my mouth. But soon... *Ah—this gentleman must be the one who came in that automobile...* I seemed to intuit this thought, and without realizing it, I turned toward that direction and straightened my posture. Then from within the giant gentleman’s small, clouded pupils emerged a cold light imbued with solemn dignity. As he began scrutinizing me with piercing intensity from above, I felt my body shrink inexplicably and found my head bowing of its own accord.

However, the giant gentleman seemed not to care in the slightest about such matters. With an extremely calm demeanor, he finished scrutinizing my entire body, then raised his eyes and began slowly surveying the room. As that pale, clouded gaze traversed every corner of the space, I—for no discernible reason—felt as though every shameful act I'd committed since awakening that morning lay utterly exposed. My body curled tighter into itself...What business could this unsettling gentleman possibly have with me?...I wondered in dread even as I feared...

And then it happened. The giant gentleman suddenly hunched forward as if startled, his body contracting. Flustered, he plunged his hand into his overcoat pocket, pulled out a white handkerchief, and hastily pressed it to his face. Before I could register this, he arched backward toward me, his entire frame shuddering as he emitted frail coughs that clashed grotesquely with his imposing stature. After several moments of labored breathing finally subsided, he slowly turned back toward me and offered another bow.

“...Pardon... My constitution being rather delicate... You’ll forgive my keeping this overcoat on...” It was indeed a voice incongruous with his physique—feminine in timbre. Yet hearing it somehow put me at ease. As this giant gentleman began appearing unexpectedly gentle and kind despite his appearance, I raised my face with a relieved sigh—only for him to cough again while deferentially extending a business card toward the tip of my nose.

“I… *hack-hack*… Pardon… forgive me…”

While accepting the business card with both hands, I managed a slight bow. Kyushu Imperial University Professor of Forensic Medicine Wakabayashi Kyōtarō Dean of the Medical Department After rereading this business card two or three times, I stood dumbfounded once more. I couldn't help but look up again at the giant gentleman before me—suppressing a cough yet standing imposingly—unable to tear my gaze away. And then,

"...This is... Kyushu University..." While muttering to myself as if in soliloquy, I couldn't help but glance restlessly from side to side. At that moment, the muscle beneath the giant Dr. Wakabayashi's left eye twitched faintly. It was a bizarre expression—one that might have been this man's peculiar version of a smile. Then those white lips began to move slowly.

“...Indeed... This is Kyushu University’s Psychiatric Department - Seventh Room.” “I must beg your pardon most profoundly for disturbing your rest with this intrusion, but my reason for paying such an abrupt visit concerns nothing other than—” “...To come directly to the matter—it appears you earlier inquired of the meal-duty nurse regarding your own name... Having received a report to that effect from the night-duty physician, I came at once to inquire... How fares it now?... Have you yet recalled your own name?... Have you fully recovered all memories pertaining to your past...”

I couldn't respond. I remained agape, idiot-like—eyes rolling white—staring up at the enormous jaw before my nose... or so I think. How could I not be shocked? Since morning, had I not been haunted by the specter of my own name?

The time that had passed since I asked the nurse my name could not have been more than an hour at most—yet in that brief span, despite his illness, he had managed to dress himself properly and rush here to inquire whether I had remembered my name... That ominous haste and inexplicable eagerness... Why should the mere act of me recalling my own name constitute such a momentous event for this doctor…?

I remained doubly and triply confounded, doing nothing but compare the business card in my palm with Dr. Wakabayashi’s face. Yet strangely enough, Dr. Wakabayashi too gazed down at my face without blinking. He seemed intent on awaiting my response, his mouth tightly shut as he stared at my face with such intensity it might bore through flesh. Within that strained expression lay a preparedness—vividly apparent—that harbored grave expectations regarding my reply. The realization that whether I recalled my own name along with my past history bore some profound connection to Dr. Wakabayashi himself became unmistakably clear from his expression, causing me to tense even further.

The two of us remained locked in a mutual glare for a short while……but……eventually, Dr. Wakabayashi—having seemingly perceived my inability to offer any response—closed his eyes softly with evident disappointment. But when his eyelids opened blearily once more, a smile deeper than before seemed to appear from his left cheek to his lips. At the same time, he seemed to have misinterpreted my dazed state as being flustered in some other sense, nodding faintly two or three times as he moved his lips.

“...That is perfectly reasonable.” “Your bewilderment is entirely justified.” “As one who must strictly uphold forensic medicine’s principles, my involvement in psychiatric affairs constitutes an undeniable breach of protocol. Yet regarding this matter... there exist profoundly inescapable circumstances...”

Having begun to say this, Dr. Wakabayashi once again assumed the posture of someone about to cough, but this time seemed to subside without incident. While blinking rapidly behind the handkerchief, he continued speaking with labored breath.

"...The reason I say this is none other than— ...To speak truthfully, until very recently, this psychiatric department had in residence an esteemed scholar named Dr. Masaki Keishi as its chief professor." ...Masaki... Keishi...

“...Indeed... This Dr. Masaki Keishi was not merely an esteemed scholar who carried weight in our nation’s academic circles alone, but in those of the entire world—a great man who resolutely established a new theory of ‘mental science’ that would bring about a fundamental revolution in psychiatric research, which had long remained stagnant... Though let me clarify—this was by no means akin to the unscientific studies conducted thus far, such as spiritualism or séances.” “That this constitutes an epoch-making new scientific doctrine—devised upon a foundation of pure science—admits of no doubt when one observes how Dr. Masaki established within these walls a psychiatric treatment facility unparalleled in the world, thereby steadily demonstrating the truth of his theories… It goes without saying that you yourself are one who has undergone this new form of treatment…”

"I... psychiatric treatment..." "Indeed... Thus for me—a specialist in forensic medicine—to inquire about your condition in this manner, when you were under Dr. Masaki's responsible care, constitutes nothing short of gross impropriety. I must humbly acknowledge that your current suspicions are entirely justified... However... To our profound regret, Dr. Masaki entrusted his final affairs to me before passing away suddenly one month ago... Furthermore, as no successor professor has yet been appointed—and with no suitable associate professors previously in place—I have assumed temporary management of this department's work under the university president's orders... Among these duties, the most critical one I accepted at Dr. Masaki's personal bequest was none other than devoting my utmost efforts to your care." "To rephrase—the honor of this psychiatric department, nay, the entire Kyushu University Medical Department's reputation currently hangs solely upon one matter... whether you recover your past memories... whether you recall your own name. I assure you there exists sound reason for this assertion."

When Dr. Wakabayashi finished saying this, I felt everything around me suddenly grow blindingly bright and blinked rapidly. The ghost of my name seemed about to emerge from somewhere nearby, radiating a halo... But... in the very next instant, I was overcome by such a wretched feeling that I couldn’t lift my face, and found myself hanging my head helplessly.

…There could be no doubt—this was indeed a psychiatric ward room within Kyushu Imperial University. And I… was I confined here in this Seventh Room as a single psychiatric patient? There could be no doubt—I was indeed a human being confined here.

...The fact that my head had felt somehow off-kilter since waking this morning must have been because I had contracted some mental illness... No. It is proof that I am still afflicted... That's right. I am a lunatic.

……Alas… I am a wretched lunatic… ...It was through Dr. Wakabayashi’s excessively polite explanation that every shred of unbearable shame—the sort that defies description—first crystallized in clear consciousness. My chest began pounding until breathing grew labored. Whether shame, terror, or sorrow—I couldn’t distinguish which emotion—needles seemed to prick my entire body as the flesh from ears to nape blazed anew. ……My eyes burned of their own accord, overwhelmed by an urge to hurl myself face-first onto the bed. Miserably pressing both palms to my face, I gently pressed fingertips against the corners of my eyes.

Dr. Wakabayashi audibly gulped twice while looking down at me in that state. Then, as if addressing nobility, he clasped his hands before him and comforted me in a tone dripping with exaggerated kindness—a voice so saccharine it verged on unctuous. "That is perfectly reasonable." "That is absolutely and perfectly reasonable." "When anyone first discovers themselves in this hospital room, they experience a near-despondent shock... But there's no need for concern." "You are hospitalized in this ward under entirely different circumstances than the other patients here..."

“...I-I... am... different from the other patients...” “...Indeed... You are the one who has offered yourself as the most invaluable research material within these epoch-making psychiatric experiments called 'Liberation Therapy for Lunatics'—experiments founded in this psychiatric department by Dr. Masaki, whom I just mentioned...” “...I... I... experimental material for lunatic liberation therapy... liberating and treating madmen...”

Dr. Wakabayashi nodded while leaning his torso forward slightly. ...as if showing respect to the name “Liberation Therapy for the Insane.”

“Indeed, indeed.” “That is precisely the case.” “How truly epoch-making were both the distinguished character of Dr. Masaki—who founded these ‘Liberation Therapy for the Insane’ experiments—and the revolutionary theory he devised, you shall soon come to understand. Moreover… through the precise workings of your own brain matter, you have consummated Dr. Masaki’s novel mental science experiments with astonishing success, thereby imprinting this university’s name upon academic circles worldwide.” “...Moreover, you—who had utterly lost consciousness due to the violent mental impulses manifested through those experiments—are now, at this very moment, in the throes of vividly recovering it.” “...It follows that you stand not only as the central representative of a certain wondrous experiment conducted within the liberation therapy facility, but also—indisputably—as the august guardian of Kyushu University’s honor.”

“H...how could I... be at the center of such a terrifying experiment...” I lunged forward impulsively, leaning out from the edge of the bed. I myself grew terrified as I was pulled deeper into this increasingly grotesque tale’s vortex... While looking down at my face, Dr. Wakabayashi nodded with even greater composure than before.

“That is an entirely reasonable doubt.” “...However... regrettably regarding that matter, I cannot provide a clear explanation at this time.” “Before long—until you yourself recall the course of events...” “I myself will remember… H-how can I remember that…” I stammered even more urgently. Dr. Wakabayashi’s manner of speaking once again made me feel vividly reminded of psychiatric patients’ wretchedness...

However, Dr. Wakabayashi remained calm. He quietly raised his hand to stop me.

“W-Wait... Please wait.” “That is precisely the nature of these circumstances.” “To speak truthfully, I must inform you that profoundly complex and utterly inscrutable circumstances—ones which cannot be exhausted in a single day and night—lurk behind the course of events that led to your entering this liberation therapy facility.” “Moreover, I must inform you that these circumstances defy any attempt I might make to compile their sequence through my own reasoning alone—for doing so risks reducing everything to mere fiction… In short, unless you yourself, who directly experienced these profoundly inscrutable events, recall their course through your own memories, no one could accept this tale as truth… Such is the phantasmagorical, astonishing nature of the circumstances embedded within your past recollections… However… For your present reassurance, I believe it permissible to explain this much: Namely… The so-called ‘Liberation Therapy for the Insane’ was designed by Dr. Masaki shortly after his appointment to this university in February of this year, completed in July, and subjected to a mere four months of experimentation before being shuttered upon his passing exactly one month ago—on October twentieth. Furthermore, during that brief period, the experiments Dr. Masaki conducted centered upon none other than the restoration of your past memories.” “And as a result of this, Dr. Masaki had clearly predicted that you—who had long since fallen into a peculiar mental state—would undoubtedly recover to your present condition before long.”

“……Dr. Masaki, who has passed away… predicted my current state…” “Indeed, indeed.” “While tenderly caring for you as our university’s most prized possession, you will undoubtedly return to your original state of consciousness.” “Dr. Masaki resolutely declared that you yourself would demonstrate both the principles of his grand theory and the effects of the experiments born from those principles.” “Moreover, should you indeed succeed in fully recovering all your past memories in accordance with Dr. Masaki’s words, I myself—even I—could not help but believe that as an inevitable consequence, you would simultaneously recall the truth of that nearly unprecedented eerie and tragic crime in which you were once involved.” “Of course, I still firmly believe that to be true as well, but…”

“...Unprecedented... an unprecedented crime... I was involved...”

“Indeed. Though I say ‘unprecedented’ for now, it may well be considered an abnormal incident of such magnitude that one might deem it unparalleled in history.”

“Wh...what k-kind of... incident...” Without even time to exhale, I leaned out from the edge of the bed.

However, Dr. Wakabayashi remained utterly composed. He continued speaking smoothly while standing erect. With those pallid eyes quietly looking down at me— "...The incident in question is none other than— "...What could I possibly conceal? "As for the research on mental science conducted by Dr. Masaki—whom I just mentioned—I myself have long received instruction from him, and even now continue pursuing studies regarding 'crimes applying mental science'—"

“...Mental science... crimes applying...” “Indeed… However, if left at that alone, this subject matter may prove too novel for its content to be readily comprehensible. But having stated it thus, you should now grasp the general outline.” "...The very reason I embarked upon research into such subject matter was that I perceived how Dr. Masaki's proposed 'mental science' itself overflowed with principles and precepts of an excessively terrifying nature." “For example—within ‘Psychopathology,’ a subdivision of this mental science—there exist countless horrifying theories and case studies demonstrating how a human’s mental state can be abruptly transformed into that of another person through suggestive influence… how one’s present psyche can be instantaneously erased and replaced by ancestral character traits latent deep within their mind’s recesses—traits inherited from forebears several generations prior… Moreover, though these theories’ applied experimental effects remain scientifically precise and profoundly consequential, their operational explanations and methodologies differ entirely from conventional science—being utterly mundane… so elementary that even women and children could nod along in amusement depending on how they’re described… which renders this research more perilous than any other endeavor imaginable. …Of course, their full details shall soon unfold vividly before your eyes, so I shall refrain from elaborating here—”

“Eh... Eh... The contents of such terrifying research... before my eyes...” Dr. Wakabayashi nodded with utmost solemnity.

“Indeed, indeed.” “As you are one who has personally proven the truth of this theory, not only have you developed an immunity to the terror and dread depicted by such principles, but upon recovering your memories of the past in the near future, you will naturally come to realize that you possess both the right and qualification to participate in this new academic discipline’s research. However, should the contents of this secret research ever leak to others, there is no predicting what calamities might arise.” “For instance, should one discover a terrifying inherited psychological trait lurking in the depths of a person’s psyche and then apply a suggestion precisely tailored to it, they could drive that individual insane in an instant.” “If we were to enter an era where not only could one drive an individual mad, but even erase that individual’s memories of the culprit responsible—what then?” “The harmful effects in question could never be compared to how Mr. Nobel’s invention of gun-cotton manufacturing methods intensified wars across the world.”

“Therefore, from the standpoint of my profession in forensic medicine, I must consider it gravely perilous should theories of this mental science come to permeate general society as common knowledge in the future, akin to how theories of materialistic science prevail in the modern age. “At that time, we must steel ourselves to accept as an inevitable consequence that crimes applying mental science will proliferate just as those applying materialistic science run rampant in the modern age—yet once that occurs, there will be no possibility of recovery. “For should crimes applying mental science come to fruition—unlike recent crimes applying materialistic science—it has become abundantly clear in advance that offenses nearly impossible to prosecute or investigate would undoubtedly emerge in every corner of the world. Thus, we must take utmost care to ensure Dr. Masaki’s new theory is absolutely never disclosed externally. “At the same time—though this may seem a rather self-serving justification—I concluded that we must exhaustively research methods to prevent such crimes and investigate their detection, anticipating worst-case scenarios. Thus, for many years past under Dr. Masaki’s guidance, I have been advancing investigations across all fronts under the strictest secrecy, pursuing a research theme titled ‘Crimes Applying Mental Science and Their Evidentiary Traces.’ “In short, it took on the appearance of something akin to a joint enterprise between Dr. Masaki and myself…”

“…Yet—what manner of negligence existed between Dr. Masaki and myself… Despite such meticulous precautions, an inexplicable criminal incident suddenly occurred not far from this university—one that brilliantly applied in practice the very theory from mental science which exhibits the most intense and profound effects… though when or by what means its perpetrator stole this knowledge remains unknown.” “I must inform you that this crime’s outward manifestation is structured around a heinous act of ruthless, cold-blooded cruelty—one wherein several men and women belonging to a certain affluent family lineage were made to kill one another or drive each other mad without any discernible motive… Furthermore, the genesis of our confirmation that the methodology behind these atrocities maintains a connection to the mental science we have been researching lies in an incident that befell a single gentle, intellectually astute young man belonging to that wealthy family’s final bloodline… To elaborate: On the night preceding his wedding to a beautiful cousin who adored him—a union intended to preserve his family’s dwindling lineage—this young man entered an unforeseen somnambulistic state and proceeded to strangle the young woman to death.” “And so… it was only after this extraordinarily peculiar and inexplicable fact came to light—that he had calmly unfurled paper and sketched while the girl’s corpse lay before him—that the incident became a major scandal… Yet… even now, these two fundamental questions remain unresolved: what purpose drove plunging the young man’s family lineage into such a wretched state, and who the perpetrator truly is… rendering this case one whose depths of strangeness and gravity defy all comprehension.” “…Even the judicial authorities of Fukuoka Prefecture—referred to as the Kyushu Metropolitan Police Headquarters—have, in this case alone, thoroughly opted for a path indistinguishable from incompetence. Consequently, I too—who commenced investigating this incident with all my might under Dr. Masaki’s guidance—find myself today in a state akin to wandering in a thick fog of confusion, utterly unable to grasp even a single clue toward the truth of this affair.”

“…And… given such circumstances, the sole investigative method remaining at my disposal for this case is none other than… to have you yourself—the central figure who survived this incident—directly determine the truth of the affair once your past memories are restored through Dr. Masaki’s posthumous virtue… to have you yourself indicate both the crime’s purpose and the perpetrator’s identity… It has thus become evident that no alternative course of action exists.” “Thus, with such divinely elusive methods has the fiendish perpetrator of this incident concealed their tracks… Having stated it thus, you must now comprehend.” “The reason I find myself unable to provide concrete explanations regarding that incident from my own mouth is that I myself have yet to ascertain the truth of the matter.” “Furthermore… that I—a specialist in another field—have involved myself in psychiatric work to personally tend to your care stems from my desire to guard against the leakage of such grave secrets… while simultaneously arising from my conviction that should your memories ever recover, I must rush here without delay to have you recount the incident’s truth before all others… to have you expose the true identity of the mysterious fiend obscuring that truth…” “…And should you—through the recovery of your past memories—succeed in elucidating this incident’s truth, then as an inevitable consequence, a research publication of twofold, threefold profound significance shall be cast upon both the modern scientific community and general society alike, thereby stirring a worldwide sensation.” “Namely—the esteemed research that Dr. Masaki had superficially labeled ‘Liberation Therapy for the Insane’… In truth, not only will a certain grave fact—one that should serve as the definitive conclusion to a grand experiment capable of transforming modern material culture into spiritual culture with a single stroke—be scientifically substantiated, but simultaneously, under that same gentleman’s guidance, I shall have the honor of rendering perfectly complete one of the most crucial exemplars within my own ongoing treatise titled *Crimes Applying Mental Science and Their Evidentiary Traces*.” “And thus, the research on mental science that Dr. Masaki and I have devoted our hearts and souls to over these past twenty years will be granted the opportunity for simultaneous publication.” “Therefore… whether you will indeed recall your own name.” “As for whether you will recover your past memories and elucidate the truth of that incident… given its twofold, threefold significance, not only this university’s internal body or Fukuoka Prefecture’s judicial authorities, but indeed the eyes and ears of the entire world have come to focus upon this matter. …And yet…”

Having explained everything up to this point in one breath, Dr. Wakabayashi suddenly cast me a strange, pallid glance. No sooner had I registered this than he turned sharply aside again, pressing his handkerchief to his face as he began coughing with desperate intensity. While gazing at his wrinkled, twitching profile, I sat dazed as though engulfed in smoke. Not one of the chaotic events swirling around me since morning had failed to plant fresh anxieties and shocks... And yet Dr. Wakabayashi's explanations for them kept ballooning more extravagantly, more supernaturally by the moment—so divorced from reality they seemed implausible... Though they initially sounded like matters intimately tied to my existence, I increasingly felt them transforming into something utterly disconnected from me—a phantom tale slipping through my fingers like smoke...

Then, once his coughing subsided, Dr. Wakabayashi gave another piercing pale-eyed nod. “Excuse me… As I grow fatigued…” As he spoke, he turned to the flimsy rattan chair behind him and gradually settled into it—but seeing his mannerisms, I found myself unable to look away. When I first noticed that rattan chair positioned behind Dr. Wakabayashi, its fragile appearance had made me think it might collapse under anyone slightly larger, leaving me to wonder if perhaps another person—a woman, maybe—might arrive… Yet now I watched as his elongated torso slid effortlessly between the narrow armrests. Doubling over at chest and abdomen, he lowered his face—only eyes visible above the handkerchief—until it nearly touched his kneecaps, as though declaring… *“I am the spectral fiend lurking behind this grotesque affair”*… shrinking listlessly before collapsing fully into the chair. The structure now appeared half its original size; even accounting for his gaunt frame… even disregarding his threadbare fur coat… this defied all human norms. And from within that compressed space, his voice emerged unchanged—no… steadier now from being seated—resonating as though announcing, “I know everything.”

“...My deepest apologies… However, having just observed your condition, even I—a layperson in this field—can clearly see how Dr. Masaki’s prophecy has been fulfilled with divine accuracy.” “At present, you must find yourself in distress—striving and striving to recover your past memories yet unable to recall a single thing.” “That is nothing more than a single process in the midst of your return to the healthy mental consciousness you possessed before undergoing this experiment.” “According to Dr. Masaki’s research, within your brain matter—specifically in a certain area governing the subconscious that belongs to your oldest memories among those parts reflecting and interacting with past recollections—there existed a point of genetic weakness: a single locus possessing extraordinary sensitivity.”

“Yet on the other hand, there must have existed some mysterious individual who had long been aware of such facts.” “By employing an intensely potent mental science suggestion material that stimulated that most sensitive weakness to its absolute depths, they drove that point into extreme tension. As a result, the memory of your ancient, thousand-year-old ancestor’s bizarre and profoundly grim romance—which had been genetically latent there—completely detached itself, rising to the surface of your consciousness while plunging you into a deep, deep somnambulistic state.” “And so, having reached this day, the somnambulistic psychology that emerged and detached from your subconscious has been utterly exhausted, returning to a state of emptiness—which is why you have now been released from that somnambulistic state. However, those regions of the subconscious that continued their abnormal activity and the adjacent portions of brain matter responsible for reflecting and interacting with past memories retain profound fatigue from prolonged strain, rendering them entirely nonfunctional at present.” “In other words—the older the memory, the more profoundly you find yourself unable to recall it… Thus, only those portions [of your brain] responsible for reflecting and interacting with extremely fresh, recent impressions—which had not yet been significantly fatigued—have provisionally awakened since this morning. Yet despite frantically striving to recover still older memories… you remain incapable of recalling even one… This is what we consider to be your current state of mental consciousness.” “Dr. Masaki had tentatively named such a condition ‘ego loss syndrome,’ but…”

“…Ego… loss syndrome…” “Indeed… you fell victim to the mental scientific criminal methods employed by the mysterious perpetrator concealed behind that bizarre incident. As a result, for several months thereafter, you continued existing in an abnormal somnambulistic state as an entirely separate individual from your current self… Of course, such profound somnambulism—or extreme instances of split personality—differ entirely from the mild split-personality somnambulism commonly seen in ordinary people… that is to say, mere feigned madness or delusional states. While exceedingly rare, facts clearly documenting such phenomena have nevertheless been discovered in historical records.” “For instance, such bizarre documented cases as *An Elder Who Recalled His Homeland After Fifty Years*; *A Gentleman’s Memoir of Realizing He Was a Murderer Only After Confrontation with Evidence*; *A Lonely Old Lady’s Confession Upon Meeting Her Biological Child Whom She Had No Memory of Bearing*; *A Pauper Youth’s Journal of Becoming a Bald-Headed Tycoon While Unconscious from a Train Collision*; *The Tale of a Young Wife Who Slept One Night Only to Awaken as a White-Haired Crone*; or *A Saintly Monk’s Confession of Committing Grave Sin After Mistaking Dreams for Reality*—all these strange examples remain preserved across various literatures, plunging the public into skeptical uncertainty. Yet when examined against Dr. Masaki’s original theoretical framework—as I have just outlined—their reality leaves no room for doubt.” “Not only has the scientific possibility of such phenomena’s existence been clearly and urgently substantiated, but it has also been proven through both theoretical principles and practical evidence that when such individuals return to their former mental consciousness, they must inevitably undergo a certain period of *ego loss syndrome*.” “…In the strictest sense, within our daily lives, our psychological state ceaselessly changes as it is stimulated by what we see and hear.” “Thus, when one alone grows angry, grieves, or grins to oneself, this too constitutes a form of somnambulism—for at every instant where such psychological changes occur, the processes of ‘somnambulism,’ ‘ego loss,’ and ‘ego awakening’ repeat themselves with extreme brevity… Dr. Masaki has concurrently proven the fact that ordinary people simply remain unaware of this.” “Therefore, it goes without saying that you too would undergo this process, and Dr. Masaki had clearly foreseen that before long, you would be restored to your current condition—leaving only the question of time as the sole remaining matter.”

Dr. Wakabayashi here paused for breath again and seemed to lick his lips. However, I do not know what expression I had at that moment. I remained rigid as if electrified, intimidated by Dr. Wakabayashi’s explanations—each phrase delivered with academic authority, each clause tightening like a screw at a steep angle despite my utter incomprehension… So this “bizarre incident” he spoke of… was it truly about me?… Was I now standing at the precipice where I must recall that horrific past event alongside my own name?… With unutterable terror oozing cold sweat beneath both armpits, I focused every nerve on the pallid, elongated face before me… or so it seemed.

At that moment, Dr. Wakabayashi slightly lowered his pale blue eyes and adopted an even lower tone than before. “I repeat—each and every one of Dr. Masaki’s predictions has been fulfilled without the slightest deviation to this very day.” “You have already—since this morning—completely departed from your previous somnambulistic mental state and now stand upon the very verge of recovering your ancient memories—I must inform you.” “Therefore—as an initial measure—I have come here in this manner to assist you in recalling your own name, having first inquired with the nurse earlier.”

“...B...But make me remember…” Having shouted this, I was suddenly left breathless by a heart-stopping realization… Could it be… that I myself was the true culprit behind this bizarre incident?… That Dr. Wakabayashi’s peculiarly intense focus on my name served as proof of this very fact?… Such fleeting flashes of insight struck me… Yet Dr. Wakabayashi answered with casual calm.

“...Indeed.” “Should your name be recalled through your own volition, then all other memories shall accordingly rise to the surface of your consciousness.” “How truly fearsome is the principle of mental science that governs this bizarre incident from inception to conclusion.” “By what rationale—under what motive—was such an aberrant crime perpetrated?” “The identity of the mysterious fiend at this incident’s core—down to the uttermost depths of truth—must indeed be recalled simultaneously.” “...Thus, aiding you in this recollection constitutes my paramount responsibility as the one who assumed charge of you from Dr. Masaki…”

I was once again made to shudder before some indescribably dreadful premonition. I involuntarily adjusted my sitting position and let out a shrill voice.

“What is it... my name is...” The instant I asked this, Dr. Wakabayashi snapped his mouth shut like a mechanical device. As if probing for something within my psyche… or perhaps insinuating some grave revelation, he fixed me with a stare from eyes that glimmered dully, peering into the depths of my own. Looking back, I realize I must have been ensnared in Dr. Wakabayashi’s immeasurable machinations at that very moment. The ostensibly scientific yet intensely provocative narrative he’d woven thus far was far from meaningless. It constituted nothing less than a psychological stimulus method engineered to focus my entire attention on “my name” to its breaking point—an irresistible compulsion toward recollection. ...Thus, precisely as I became consumed with demanding my own identity, he’d sealed his lips—through that silence seeking to elevate my desperation to its zenith. His aim must have been to force me into violently triggering the resurrection of congealed memories within my cerebral matter.

However, at that time, I hadn’t detected even a speck of such a delicate scheme. I had simply become convinced that Dr. Wakabayashi was about to tell me my name at any moment, and could do nothing but stare fixedly at those bloodless lips. Then Dr. Wakabayashi—who had been observing my demeanor—seemed disappointed yet again and silently closed his eyes. He slowly shook his head from side to side and let out a faint sigh, then quietly opened his eyes again and spoke in a voice colder, more delicate than before.

“That won’t do…” “If I were to inform you myself, it would be of no use.” “If you were to say you have no memory of such a name, that would be the end of it.” “It must still be something recalled naturally by your own self…”

I suddenly felt both relieved and uneasy at the same time. “……Will I be able to recall it…?”

Dr. Wakabayashi answered firmly. “You are capable of it. “You are most certainly capable of it. “Moreover, at that time, not only will you come to understand that everything I have related thus far is by no means a fictional tale, but simultaneously, you will have fully recovered and been discharged from this hospital—with all preparations having long since been perfectly arranged for you to assume your legal and moral rights… that is to say, an esteemed household and all happiness belonging to that home. “In other words, unfailingly delivering all of these things to you constitutes my second responsibility inherited from Dr. Masaki, therefore…”

Having declared this, Dr. Wakabayashi once more fixed his pale blue, icy eyes upon me as though with absolute conviction. I was forced to bow my head under the pressure of those eyes... Once again, having been told nothing but these strange, convoluted stories that somehow didn’t feel like my own... I grew weary without grasping a single thing... However, Dr. Wakabayashi paid no heed to my state of mind. With a light cough, he altered the tone of his discourse.

“...Well then... I shall now commence the experiment to have you recall your name... We... as did Dr. Masaki... shall sequentially present before your eyes various articles we firmly believe bear the most profound connection to your past history... thereby conducting an experiment to ascertain whether your former memories have been roused... How does this proposal find you?”

As he spoke, he placed both hands on the arms of the rattan chair and stretched his posture taut. While keeping my eyes on his face, I bowed my head slightly. ...Not at all. However it may be... As you wish... in that manner... However, deep down, I was not a little hesitant. No, rather, I even felt a kind of absurdity. Could it be that both the girl from Room Six who has been calling out to me since this morning and Dr. Wakabayashi now before my eyes are similarly mistaken about my identity?

…Could they have mistaken me for someone else—calling out so fervently and reproaching me like this?… Is that why, no matter how much time passes or how I’m pressed, I remain like this—utterly unable to recall a single thing?

...Could it be that these supposed mementos from my past they're about to show me are in truth nothing but relics belonging to complete strangers?... That some cold-blooded, vicious psychiatric patient lurking unseen—this unknown fiend—left behind these grotesque, cruelty-laden crime tokens... and now they'll force me to view these horrors one after another, badgering me to remember?

...Indulging in such unbecoming imaginings, I found myself involuntarily shrinking back, making myself small.

At that moment, Dr. Wakabayashi—maintaining his characteristic scholarly refinement and humility to the last—bowed quietly to me as he rose from the rattan chair. When he slowly opened the door behind him, a small man—as if waiting in readiness—strode in with brisk, purposeful steps. The small man had a close-cropped head that gleamed under institutional lights, his jet-black handlebar mustache waxed stiff above thin lips. He wore an unfamiliar ensemble—a starched white high-collared jacket buttoned to the throat over black trousers—with slippers cobbled from old shoes slapping against concrete floors. He carried a square black leather case in one hand and a slightly worn folding chair in the other. As he entered behind him like some grotesque valet. He then placed his black case beside my chair with theatrical precision—the snap of its opening echoing like a pistol shot—and began extracting barber’s tools from its chaotic interior while bobbing his head in quick mechanical bows. “At your service,” his gestures seemed to rasp through waxed mustache hairs. Dr. Wakabayashi answered this pantomime by dragging his rattan throne closer to my bedside—the screech of wicker on stone setting my teeth on edge—and fixed me with that serpent’s gaze that said clearer than words: Submit.

……So I was going to have my head shaved here... I thought. Barefoot, I stepped down from the bed and perched on the folding chair. Almost simultaneously, the small man with the handlebar mustache snapped a white cloth around me. Then, while winding a towel wrung from scalding water tightly around my head and pressing it firmly into place, he turned to look back at Dr. Wakabayashi. “The same style as last time, if that’s acceptable…”

When he heard this question, Dr. Wakabayashi seemed to give a slight start. He appeared to steal a furtive glance at my face but soon replied in a lingering tone.

“Ah. “Did I entrust this to you previously as well?” “Do you recall?” “The cutting method from that occasion…” “Ah. “Being precisely one full month prior, and a special request it was, I remember clearly.” “Leaving the center elevated to render the entire countenance a gentle oval...the periphery trimmed quite short, in the manner of Tokyo students…” “Indeed. “Please execute it identically this time.”

“Understood.” Amidst such exchanges, the scissors began to snip atop my head. Dr. Wakabayashi once again sank into the rattan chair at the head of the bed, appearing to pull out some red-covered Western book from his overcoat pocket.

I closed my eyes and began to think.

In any case, my past was gradually coming into focus like this. Setting aside the outlandish tales of fate and such that Dr. Wakabayashi had told me as entirely separate matters, it seemed that only those facts I could accept as true were gradually being pieced together in this manner. I had been an inpatient in the Psychiatric Department of Kyushu Imperial University since the fifteenth year of Taisho (though I don’t know when that was), and it appears I spent every day until yesterday in a somnambulistic trance of utter oblivion. And whether during that period or before it remains unclear, but it appears that about one month prior, I had my hair cut in a modern student style. To that former appearance, I am now being restored... or so...

...However... even if one might think so, how meager these fragments were as a person's past memories. Moreover, even that was merely what I had heard from a complete stranger—a medical doctor—and a barber, so the only events I could truly remember as my own past were those that had occurred in the few hours since this morning—since hearing that... droning... clock sound—up to the present moment. The time before that... droning... was utter nothingness to me—I could not even discern whether I had been alive or dead.

Where on earth was I born, and how did I come to grow up like this? What is that? What is this? This discernment to distinguish each thing one by one... this knowledge... or this scholarly capacity to comprehend Dr. Wakabayashi’s explanations with such trembling profundity... Where did I come by all these things? How could I have forgotten such an immense, boundless expanse of past memories so utterly and completely...?

As I closed my eyes while turning these thoughts over and stared fixedly at the hollow within my skull, my soul shrank smaller and smaller until it seemed like a microorganism wandering aimlessly through infinite emptiness. ...Lonely... hollow... this sad feeling... eyes growing inexplicably hot... ...Something icy... touched the nape of my neck. It was that the barber, who had finished cutting my hair without my noticing, had applied soap lather to my nape in preparation for shaving.

I slumped dejectedly, my head drooping. However... when I reconsidered, I realized that even one month prior, I had once again had my head restored to its former state by Dr. Wakabayashi. If that were so, then perhaps even prior to that one month, I had experienced something as terrifying as what I witnessed this morning. Moreover, judging by Dr. Wakabayashi’s tone, it seemed he hadn’t limited his orders for restoring my head to this barber alone. If this were true, then I might have repeated this very act not only before that time, but even further back... over and over countless times—in which case, when all was said and done, might I not be like some tedious sleepwalker, endlessly reenacting these same motions again and again?... Such thoughts occurred to me.

Could Dr. Wakabayashi be such a ruthless scientist, conducting nothing but these tests?... No. Could it be that all the events that had occurred around me continuously since this morning were nothing but hallucinations of a sleepwalker like myself?... ...At present, I was here, dreaming that I was having my head cut in a modern style and receiving grooming from my sideburns to above and below my eyebrows—so the real me... my physical body was not here. ...while the real me was somewhere entirely different, in some preposterous place, engaged in some preposterous somnambulism...

...In the midst of these thoughts, I jolted upright from the chair... With the white cloth still wrapped around my neck, I thought I had bolted straight out... but that wasn't what happened. ...When a tremendous commotion suddenly erupted above my head, leaving me unable to open my eyes or mouth, I instinctively dropped my half-risen body back into the chair and hunched my neck tight. It was because two round combs had aligned atop my head and begun racing about so chaotically I couldn't breathe... yet... how strangely pleasant it felt... In an instant, I couldn't tell whether I was the madman or who was... ...Joy, sorrow, fear, frustration—past, present, all cosmic phenomena—I became like some wretched spirit severed from everything. Slumped exhaustedly against the chair, I felt to my marrow a pleasure that churned up a bottomless, maddening itch—a sensation seeping through every pore to permeate my very bones. ...There was nothing left to do now. I don't understand why, but from now on I'll obey Dr. Wakabayashi's orders absolutely. I had grown utterly disheartened—completely resigned to everything, no matter what might become of my future...

“Step this way.”

A young woman’s voice rang out right by my ear. Startled, I opened my eyes to find two nurses who had entered unnoticed, now firmly gripping both my arms from either side as though I were a criminal or some such. The white cloth strip around my neck had been removed by the barber without my noticing, and he was shaking it out vigorously beyond the door. At that moment, Dr. Wakabayashi—who had been absorbed in reading a red-covered Western book—snapped it shut and stood up. Lengthening his already elongated face with a hacking cough, he gestured toward the door with both hands as if to say, "Please proceed this way."

From beneath the hair and dandruff covering my entire face, I barely managed to open my eyes. With both hands still gripped by the nurses, stepping barefoot on the cold floor stones, I stepped outside the door for what felt like the first time in my life...? Dr. Wakabayashi had come to see me off outside the door but seemed to have disappeared somewhere along the way. Outside lay a wide corridor of artificial stone, doors identical to mine lining both sides—five facing five across the passage. In a dim alcove at the corridor's end hung a man-sized grandfather clock, swathed in iron bars and wire mesh matching my room's window. This had to be the clock that droned... in that midnight hour... rousing me from sleep. Though I couldn't see where to insert a winding key, its antiquated hands—adorned with arabesque patterns and ominously shaped—pointed to 6:04 while clacking as they swung a massive brass pendulum ball. The mechanism resembled some punished soul condemned to eternal repetition. To this clock's left stood my room, its door flanked by a white-painted plaque about thirty centimeters long. In Gothic black lettering, small characters read "Psychiatry, East Wing, First Ward" with larger text below declaring "Room No.7." No patient nameplate existed.

As the two nurses pulled me by the hands, I turned my back to the clock and began walking. Then, before long, when we emerged into a bright outer corridor, a blue-painted two-story wooden Western-style building appeared directly ahead. The corridor's flanks were pristine white sand where blood-red shaggy chrysanthemums, dream-white cosmos, and crimson-yellow cockscomb flowers shaped like strange internal organs bloomed in profusion, while beyond them on both sides stretched deep green pine groves. The morning sun’s light gently shone upon the thin clouds passing over the pine grove, and from somewhere far away came the sound of waves drifting quietly, quietly—a soothing sensation…

"...Ah... So it's autumn now," I thought. Drawing a deep breath of the crisp, flowing fresh air into my lungs brought momentary relief, but before I could linger to survey the scenery, the two nurses yanked both my arms with renewed force, hauling me into the shadowed corridor of the azure Western-style building ahead. When we reached the room at the right-hand junction, another nurse who had been waiting there opened the door and entered alongside us.

The room was quite large—a bright bathroom. Steam gushing from the stone bathtub by the far window glistened as it dripped and streamed down all three glass panes. In their midst, three red-cheeked nurses—all three thrusting out their uniformly round red arms and red legs high into the air—suddenly seized me, swiftly stripped me completely naked, and drove me into the bathtub. Once I had warmed up sufficiently, they immediately yanked me out onto the wooden slats of the washing area. Pressing cold soap and sponges against me from all sides, they scrubbed vigorously without a hint of restraint. Then, abruptly pressing down on my head, they rubbed a bar of soap vigorously against my scalp, building up a mountain of lather before raking through it with a violence unimaginable from women. Without warning, they splashed scalding water over me, rendering me unable to open my eyes or mouth, before once again seizing both my arms without a word,

“Come on, this way!” With shrill voices barking orders, they drove me back into the bathtub once more. The brutality of their methods… It was so extreme I almost wondered if among those three nurses lurked the very one who’d brought my meal this morning—the one I’d subjected to such cruelty—now exacting her revenge. Yet upon closer observation, their handling of me seemed no different from their daily routine of handling lunatics, plunging me into utter despair.

Yet near the end of this process, when they trimmed my overgrown fingernails and toenails, scrubbed my mouth clean with a bamboo-handled brush and salt, let me warm myself once more, then dried every inch of my body with a fresh towel before vigorously combing through my hair with a new yellow comb, I truly felt reborn—as though given new life. Even though I was so refreshed and clear-headed, when I wondered why I still couldn't recall my own past, I ended up feeling so inexplicably good that it was utterly perplexing.

“Change into this.” When one of the nurses said this, I turned around to look and found that the patient clothes I had taken off and left on the wooden floor had vanished somewhere, replaced by a large light yellow cloth-wrapped bundle. When I untied the knot, inside was a university student’s uniform in a white cardboard box, along with a school cap, a speckled overcoat, a knit undershirt, trousers, brown half-socks, lace-up shoes wrapped in newspaper… And when I opened the small leather pouch placed on top, out came a small silver wristwatch gleaming brightly.

I had no time to harbor suspicions about such things as I received each item from the nurse and put them on, but upon casually checking afterward, none of these articles bore any initials or markings that might indicate they were my belongings. However, every single one of them had sharp creases as if freshly tailored, and when I shook my body, they fit as snugly as if they were old familiars. The only thing that felt slightly constricting was the new collar of my jacket's high neckline, but I was astonished at how perfectly everything else fit—the brand-new square cap, gleaming lace-up shoes, even the length of the black ribbon on the wristwatch showing 6:23. So strange that when I thrust both hands into the coat pockets, my right touched a freshly quarter-folded handkerchief and tissues, while my left felt a small silk pouch—smoothly bulging, though I couldn’t tell how much was inside.

I felt bewitched once more. I darted my eyes around searching for a mirror, but unfortunately couldn't find even a fragment of one. The three nurses, their eyes still darting restlessly as they looked back at my face, opened the door and left.

Then, passing by the departing nurses, Dr. Wakabayashi ducked his head beneath the doorframe and lumbered into the room. As if inspecting my attire, he looked me up and down once, then silently led me to a corner of the room and removed a sun-faded yukata hanging midway up the opposite wall. What appeared from beneath was an unexpected, enormous full-length mirror.

I staggered backward involuntarily... I was shocked at how young my own reflection appeared. When I had groped around in Room 7's darkness this morning and imagined my appearance, I'd assumed I must be a rough-looking bearded man around thirty with a fearsome countenance. Yet even after receiving grooming, I never imagined such disparity could exist between the tactile impression from running my hands over my face and the actual visage before me.

The me standing rigidly in the life-sized mirror before my eyes could not be perceived as anything but a green youth barely twenty years old or so. A round forehead, a thin jawline, large eyes—a startled face. If it weren’t for the uniform, I might be mistaken for a middle school student. When I realized that this green youth was me, the tension I’d felt since this morning began rapidly draining away—or rather, I was overcome by an indescribable feeling that was somehow eerie… yet happy… yet sad… an altogether peculiar sensation.

At that moment, Dr. Wakabayashi called out from behind in a prompting manner. “...How about it... Have you remembered... Your own name...” I hurriedly removed the hat I had been about to put on. I gulped down the cold saliva and turned around—and in that moment finally understood why Dr. Wakabayashi had been manipulating me through various strange methods since earlier. Dr. Wakabayashi had promised to show me mementos of my own past, and as the first step in this process, he had confronted me with my former appearance. In other words—having memorized my pre-hospitalization appearance down to the finest details—he had restored me to that exact state before abruptly thrusting it before my eyes, undoubtedly hoping to trigger memories of the past. ...Yes... This left no room for doubt. This was unquestionably a memento of my past... Even if all else were misconceptions, this alone—the remembered image of myself—had to be absolutely beyond dispute...

However... Regrettably, Dr. Wakabayashi's painstaking efforts went unrewarded. Despite being shown my own reflection for the first time and startled by it, I remained utterly unable to recall anything at all... What’s more, realizing I was still such a green youth left me feeling more self-conscious than ever—ridiculed—filled with an indescribable dread—as I unconsciously wiped again and again at the sweat streaming down my forehead and hung my head.

Dr. Wakabayashi, who had been staring intently with an expressionless gaze at my face and the face in the mirror, eventually gave a deliberate nod. “...You are quite right. Since your complexion has become considerably paler than before and you appear to have gained some weight, your current appearance may differ somewhat from how you looked prior to hospitalization... Now, please come this way. I shall attempt the next method... This time, you will surely remember...”

I retraced my steps down the corridor blooming with cockscombs, following behind Dr. Wakabayashi, my ankles in new lace-up boots and knees stiffening. Just as I thought we were returning to Room 7, Dr. Wakabayashi stopped before the door bearing a nameplate for Room 6—the one just before it—and rapped sharply. Then, pulling the large brass handle, from between the half-opened door emerged a fiftyish woman who appeared to be an attendant wearing a pale yellow apron, and she bowed deeply with deference.

The elderly woman looked up at Dr. Wakabayashi’s face as she said, "She is currently sleeping soundly."

With this deferential report, she departed toward the Western-style building we had come from. Dr. Wakabayashi cautiously craned his neck and entered inside after her. With one hand gently grasping my hand and the other quietly closing the door, he approached the iron bed laid at the base of the far wall, muffling his footsteps. And then there, after softly releasing my hand, he pointed with hairy fingers toward the face of a girl sleeping atop the bed and glanced sharply back at me.

I gripped the hat brim tightly with both hands. I doubted my own eyes and blinked hard several times. ...There lay a girl of such beauty sleeping peacefully. Her glossy abundant hair—arranged in a strange style resembling large black petals—lay disheveled and voluminous atop a pillow wrapped in white towel. She wore the same unbleached cotton patient gown I had been clad in until moments ago. Seeing her freshly bandaged hands neatly folded atop the white blanket covering her chest, it became clear this girl must indeed have been the one who had tormented me since dawn—knocking on walls and crying out. Of course, I found no trace of the ghastly bloodstains I'd imagined on those walls earlier. Yet how could one reconcile this serene innocence with the being who had wailed such terrifying, suffocating cries? From her slender crescent brows and long thick lashes to her elegantly high nose, faintly blushed cheeks, clover-tightened lips, and even the adorable translucence of her double chin—her entire sleeping form radiated such purity she might have been a preternaturally crafted doll. ...No. In that moment, truly doubting she was a doll yet forgetting everything, I found myself transfixed by her sleeping face.

Then... before my very eyes, an indescribable change—neither miraculous nor inexplicable—began to manifest across that doll-like sleeping face.

The girl’s sleeping face—with her red ears wrapped in natural hair softly arranged on a large pillow swathed in a fresh towel, her long eyelashes lying neatly and contentedly closed—began to change into an expression of sorrow so quietly, so imperceptibly that it defied the eye. Moreover, all of her slender eyebrows, thick eyelashes, and the clover-shaped outline of her small lips remained perfectly still in their original beautiful positions. Only the innocent peach hue of her girlish cheeks was shifting into a lonesome rose color—and yet this mere change alone transformed what had until moments before been the guileless sleeping face of a seventeen- or eighteen-year-old into what now appeared to be the noble countenance of a twenty-two- or twenty-three-year-old young wife before one knew it. And then, from its depths, the divine quality of that sorrowful hue appearing somehow translucent...

Once again, I began to doubt my own eyes. But rubbing my eyes was out of the question—I found myself unable to even breathe—and as I continued staring without blinking once, translucent dewdrops began seeping forth between those long, finely cut double eyelids. They rapidly swelled into large beads of moisture, clung to her long eyelashes, glistened brilliantly, and before I could grasp what was happening, streamed down both sides... Then, before long, her small lips began quivering faintly as they moved, and dreamlike, fragile words spilled out in fragments.

“...Sister... Sister... Forgive me... Forgive me...” “Though I knew he was your most cherished Dear Brother... I... your humble servant has adored him from my very core...” “Knowing full well he was Sister’s precious betrothed... yet loving him still... thus bringing us to this wretched pass... Ah... Mercy... grant me mercy... I implore you... Forgive this transgression... Dearest Sister... I beg...”

It was a halting tone that could only just be inferred from the trembling and quivering movement of her lips. Yet the tears continued welling up anew, flowing from between her long eyelashes to the outer corners of her eyes... to her faintly pale temples... then vanishing into the translucent edges of her jet-black sideburns.

However, the tears soon ceased. As the forlorn rose hue that had settled into both cheeks shifted back to its original innocent peach tone like night turning to dawn, her expression—still as motionless as a doll’s—restored itself to the healthy sleeping face of a seventeen- or eighteen-year-old girl. In the brief span of a dream, she had aged five or six years and mourned. And so she had returned to her youthful state once more... As I watched, a gentle smile even began to curl at the corners of her lips.

Once again, I heaved a long sigh from the depths of my being. Still feeling as though I hadn’t fully awakened from a dream, I timidly glanced over my shoulder. Dr. Wakabayashi stood rigidly behind me, maintaining his usual expressionless demeanor with hands clasped behind his back as he stared down at me intently. Though his wax-like complexion revealed intense inner tension, when he quietly met my gaze after a moment, he moistened his pale lips with a faint lick and spoke in a voice utterly different from before—flat and devoid of resonance.

“Do you know… this person’s… name?” I turned once more to look at the girl’s sleeping face. I shook my head furtively, as though wary of being overheard. “…No… Not at all…” That was how I answered… Then, as if pursuing my response, Dr. Wakabayashi whispered again in a low voice. “Then… do you not even recognize this person’s face?” I looked up at Dr. Wakabayashi’s face as he spoke these words and blinked several times with exaggerated emphasis.

……Preposterous…… How could I, who didn’t even know my own face, possibly remember someone else’s…… As if to say... Then, at that very moment, an indescribable look of disappointment swept across Dr. Wakabayashi’s face. With eyes turned utterly vacant, he stared fixedly at me for some time before reverting to his usual desolate expression and giving two or three slight nods. Then, together with me, he quietly turned back toward the girl. With an extremely solemn gait, he stepped forward half a pace and—as though swearing an oath before a god—clasped his hands before him while looking down at me. He spoke in a suggestive, gentle tone.

“...Then... I shall explain.” “This person is your one and only cousin, and she stands betrothed to you.” “...Ah...” I choked back a cry of surprise. Pressing my forehead, I staggered unsteadily backward. While simultaneously doubting my own eyes and ears, I let out a hoarse voice.

“Th…that’s…s-such a…th-thing…t-to be…th-this beautiful…” “Indeed, she is an extraordinarily rare beauty in this world.” “However, there is no mistake.” “This year…April 26, Taisho 15 (1926)…exactly six months ago…she was your one and only cousin who stood ready to hold your wedding ceremony.” “Due to an extraordinarily mysterious incident that occurred the previous evening, she has been living this pitiable existence up until today…”

“……………………” “Therefore… it remains my final grave responsibility—a commission I received from Dr. Masaki—to ensure that this lady and yourself are safely discharged… and thus return to a joyful married life.” Dr. Wakabayashi’s tone was slow, as if to intimidate me, and solemn. Yet I remained frozen as before, staring wide-eyed like one bewitched by a fox, able only to twist around on the bed. ...The creeping horror of having this celestial maiden-like girl I’d never seen before abruptly declared as yours and thrust upon me... The doubt... And that ineffable absurdity...

“My… my one and only cousin… but… just now… when she said ‘Sister’…” “That is her dreaming.” “As I just explained, this young lady has had no siblings from the beginning—she is an only child—but records show that the woman who was this young lady’s ancestor one thousand years ago did have an older sister.” “She is now dreaming of that woman as her own direct older sister, so...”

“How… how could you… come to know… such a thing…?” As I spoke these words, my voice trembled. I couldn’t help inching backward while looking up at Dr. Wakabayashi’s face. I suddenly began to doubt Dr. Wakabayashi’s sanity... To discern the contents of another’s dreams from the outside—such a feat could only be performed by a sorcerer. Yet here he was, calmly reciting bizarre facts from a thousand years ago—matters beyond human deduction or imagination, utterly unfathomable by mortal means. The uncanniness of it... Dr. Wakabayashi had never been an ordinary man from the start. It began to occur to me that perhaps he was not unlike myself—one of a certain type of special patient confined within this mental hospital…

But Dr. Wakabayashi showed not a trace of surprise on his face. He replied in his usual scientist-like, matter-of-fact tone. Still in that toneless, fragmented voice...

“That... becomes clear because this young lady says such things and behaves in such ways even while awake.” “...Please observe the peculiar manner in which her hair is arranged.” “This method of styling replicates coiffures worn by married women during the era of this young lady’s honorable ancestor one thousand years past—a style she periodically recreates herself... To clarify: though she remains at present a pure and unsullied maiden, whenever she personally fashions her hair thusly, it serves as proof that her entire mental existence has reverted to the habits, memories, and character of a certain married ancestress from that distant age. Naturally during these periods, no trace of maidenly qualities can be detected—neither in her gaze nor bodily demeanor.” “She appears transformed into the figure of an elegant young matron, matured so profoundly that even her apparent age becomes unrecognizable.” “...Though during intervals when she forgets such dreams, we permit attendants to style her hair into ordinary tight curls like any other patient...”

I stood there with my mouth agape. I couldn’t help but dazedly compare the mystical hairstyle with Dr. Wakabayashi’s solemn expression. “Then… then… when she said ‘brother’…”

“That again pertains to your honorable ancestor from one thousand years ago.” “Your ancestor who had become the husband of that elder sister at the time—in other words, you who were this young lady’s brother-in-law one thousand years past—she is now dreaming of the scene in which she lives together with you.”

“Th... that’s... disgraceful... adulterous...”

I started to shout—then caught my breath sharply. As I was being restrained by Dr. Wakabayashi’s pale hand moving slowly... “Shh… Quietly… If you would just recall your own name now, everything…” Dr. Wakabayashi, too, snapped his mouth shut mid-sentence. Both of them simultaneously glanced back at the girl on the bed. But it was already too late. Our voices had apparently reached the girl’s ear. While moving her small crimson lips restlessly, she quietly opened her eyes wide, and when she saw my face standing right beside her, blinked two or three times with heavy pattering sounds. The moment her double-lidded eyes glittered briefly, she appeared startlingly shocked by something, and the color of her cheeks rapidly drained to a ghastly pale. Her moist dark eyes grew larger and larger, shining forth with a beauty so great it seemed almost unearthly. As this happened, the color of her cheeks suddenly flared up crimson, reaching all the way to her ears in the same instant.

“Ah— Dear Brother… Why are you here—” she cried out as though startled and sat upright. Barefoot, she jumped down from the bed and tried to cling to me with her hem exposed.

I was stunned. Unconsciously, I brushed away her hand. Involuntarily, I leapt back two or three steps and glared... completely taken aback...

...Then, at that moment, the girl stopped dead. Her outstretched hands stiffened as if electrified. Her complexion turned deathly pale, lips bleaching of all color—and as I watched, she wrenched her eyes wide open, fixed them on my face while reeling backward, then braced both hands against the bedframe. Her lips trembled violently as she kept staring at me with desperate intensity. She then began timidly surveying Dr. Wakabayashi’s face and the room’s interior… until her eyes brimmed with glistening tears. Her head slumped forward as she crumpled onto the stone floor—but the instant she pressed her gown’s sleeve against her face, she erupted into wails and collapsed facedown on the bed, weeping convulsively.

I grew increasingly flustered. While wiping the sweat that had gushed out all over my face, I compared the back of the girl—who was crying in a voice hoarse from hitching up sobs—with Dr. Wakabayashi’s face.

Dr. Wakabayashi... yet not a single muscle in his face moved. While coldly meeting my dazed gaze, he leisurely approached the girl and bent at the waist. He asked, as though bringing his mouth close to her ear.

“Have you remembered?” “Have you remembered this person’s name… and your own name as well…” When I heard these words, it was I—not the girl—who was startled. …Could it be that this girl, like me, had fallen into an “ego-loss state,” teetering on awakening from a somnambulistic trance? …And was Dr. Wakabayashi now subjecting her to the same experiment he was conducting on me? …With my ears ringing shrilly from tension, I awaited her reply.

But the girl did not answer. For just a brief moment, she stopped crying—burying her face even deeper into the bed—and merely shook her head from side to side. “Then… you do at least remember that this person here was that Dear Brother who was betrothed to you?” The girl nodded. And then she began crying in a voice even more intense and higher-pitched than before. It was a truly grief-stricken, gut-wrenching voice—even if one heard it without knowing anything. It was the voice of a girl’s lament—a lament beyond all help or remedy—from one who seemed to have only now begun viscerally realizing her plight: stranded in the far-flung world of psychiatric patients, severed from her partner by her inability to recall her lover’s name… and even when fate granted her a chance meeting to cling to him, finding herself coldly rebuffed.

Though our genders differed, having fallen into the same mental state and being made to experience identical suffering, I found myself drawn to that hoarse broken weeping down to the very core of my being. It was utterly different from when I had been summoned in the dark this morning... No—I had been cast into a suffocating position severalfold worse than that prior state. Still unable to recall either this girl's face or name, I was tormented by an anguished conviction that this was entirely my responsibility—powerless to act against her heartrending sobs and pitiable form hunched weeping upon the white bed, trembling so violently one might think she now remembered everything and would collapse unless aided. Pressing both hands to my face, I broke into a full-body cold sweat. I grew faint—so much that I nearly staggered and fell.

However, Dr. Wakabayashi—whether he was aware of my suffering or not—still leaned his upper body forward as he gently stroked the girl’s shoulder. “Th-there... Calm... calm down... It will come back to you soon.” “This person... and your Dear Brother too... have both forgotten your face.” “But everything will return shortly.” “Once it does, he’ll tell you at once.” “Then you’ll leave this place together… Now… rest quietly.” “Wait for the appointed hour.” “It’s certainly not far off now…”

While saying this, Dr. Wakabayashi raised his face... Then, taking my hand—startled, weakened, and standing frozen while wiping away silent tears—he briskly led me outside the door and closed the heavy door firmly without hesitation. At the far end of the corridor, he clapped his hands briskly to summon the elderly attendant tending to the cockscomb flowers, then urged my still-hesitating self onward and led me back into the former Room No. 7. When I listened closely, the girl's crying voice seemed to have quieted down considerably. In every pause between her gasping sobs, I sensed that the elderly attendant was saying something to her.

Standing rigidly on the artificial stone floor, I let out a single deep sigh and steadied my nerves. For now, I looked up at Dr. Wakabayashi’s face and waited for his explanation.

……Until this very moment, not only had I never imagined such a thing even in my wildest dreams, but a peerless beauty—one whom people in general had likely never seen outside of dolls—was confined as a wretched mental patient in the room next to mine, separated from me by nothing more than a single wall.

……Moreover, this beautiful girl was not only my sole cousin and betrothed, but she was also dreaming of cohabiting with an utterly bizarre version of myself—a me who had been her sister’s husband from a thousand years ago. ……Not only that, but the moment she awoke from that dream and saw my face, she cried out “Dear Brother!” and tried to cling to me. ……she had been repelled by me, collapsed onto the floor, and was now grieving with gut-wrenching sorrow...

Regarding such utterly mysterious, intricate facts of this sort, I waited with breathless anticipation to see what explanation Dr. Wakabayashi might offer. Yet at this moment—whatever thoughts occupied Dr. Wakabayashi—he abruptly fell silent as though struck mute, his mouth snapping shut. With cold, pallid eyes that flickered toward me for only an instant, he quietly lowered his gaze and began rummaging through his waistcoat pocket with his left hand, extracting a large silver pocket watch to rest upon his palm. Then, gently pressing his right fingertips against his left wrist, he peered at the dial showing seven-thirty and commenced taking his own pulse.

Dr. Wakabayashi, with his poor health, might have made it a habit to check his pulse like this every morning at this hour. Yet even so, not a trace remained in his demeanor of the tension that had been so palpable until moments before. Instead, there now appeared a coldness akin to that between complete strangers passing on the roadside. With his small eyes lowered ghostlike, his pale lips pressed into a straight line, and his left middle finger alternately pressing and releasing against his pulse—observing this figure, it seemed he was using that very posture to suppress my agitation over the bizarre incident forced upon me in the adjacent room. ……To think—in this preposterously strange world where past, present and future… dreams and reality became jumbled—he would not only present a girl tormented by layered affections… unimaginably immoral yet supremely pure… neither maiden nor wife… indistinguishable from sane or mad… a peerless beauty one might deem impossible to exist… as “your cousin and betrothed,” but even after displaying such evidence before my very eyes, now appeared to be deliberately evading my questions about these outlandish facts.

So I, feeling an unsatisfied frustration at not knowing what to do, had no choice but to look down while fidgeting with my hat. Moreover… the moment I looked down was precisely when I felt that this doctor was somehow making light of me… Though I couldn’t fathom why, I couldn’t help but wonder if Dr. Wakabayashi was taking advantage of my addled mind to foist some preposterous fabricated story upon me—attempting to make me believe utter nonsense without a shred of truth. And then—the suspicion that he might be trying to use me for some academic experiment… no sooner had this thought flashed through my mind than it rapidly solidified into an unshakable conviction, spreading to fill every corner of my consciousness.

The way he captures me—who knows nothing—forcing me to pose as some unexpected university student, introducing a beautiful girl as my betrothed or whatnot—seeing him go to such elaborate pains only makes it seem utterly suspicious. Could it be that these clothes and hat were tailored to fit my body while I was in this dreamlike state? Moreover, that girl might be some kind of nymphomaniac confined in this hospital—who makes such bizarre gestures at anyone she sees. This hospital too might not be part of Kyushu Imperial University. Could it be that Dr. Wakabayashi standing before me—this shady figure of unknowable true nature—has dragged me here from somewhere while I’m in this state of whether he’s scrambling my brains for some reason, plunging me into some grandiose illusion to make me serve his purpose? If that weren’t the case, then there’s no reason I wouldn’t remember anything from the past upon encountering such a beautiful girl who claims to be my own betrothed. Feelings like nostalgia, joy… I should be feeling something along those lines.

……That’s right—I was indeed on the verge of being utterly deceived. ……As this realization took hold, all the doubts, confusions, and shocks that had plagued my mind until now hissed away like steam evaporating from my skull. And so, before I knew it, my mind had returned once more to its original state of clanging chaos. No responsibilities, no worries whatsoever...

However, as this happened, I found myself becoming utterly alone, assailed by a sense of aimlessness and profound loneliness, so I raised my face once more with a faint sigh. Then Dr. Wakabayashi, having apparently just finished examining his pulse, slowly dropped the pocket watch from his left palm back into its original pocket while returning to the same polite demeanor he had shown when we first met this morning.

“How are you feeling? You’re not fatigued, are you?” I was once again somewhat flustered; through Dr. Wakabayashi’s demeanor that seemed utterly indifferent, I felt increasingly mocked—yet I made an effort to nod as though nothing were wrong.

“No… Not at all…” “Ah… Then… We may continue further with examinations to help you recall your past history.” I nodded once more, casually. With a sense of ‘To hell with it all…’ Seeing this, Dr. Wakabayashi nodded in unison.

“Then I shall now guide you to the Psychiatry Department Main Building’s professor’s office at Kyushu Imperial University… the room where Dr. Masaki Keishi, whom I mentioned earlier, resided until his final day.” “There are displayed there—the mementos of your past. I firmly believe that through viewing them with care, the strange mysteries surrounding your person will gradually unravel, until at last you shall splendidly restore every last memory of your former self.” “...and I believe it will simultaneously clarify the truth behind that supremely bizarre incident entwining you and that young lady.”

Dr. Wakabayashi’s words rang with an ironclad conviction, as though bearing some profound implication. Yet I remained indifferent to such matters and lowered my head once more... Take me wherever you will. After all, things would unfold as they must... With this dismissive resignation... Simultaneously, I felt myself driven by a flicker of curiosity—what new strangeness might they produce next...

Then Dr. Wakabayashi also nodded with satisfaction.

“...Well then... this way, please...”

The Psychiatry Department Main Building of Kyushu Imperial University’s Faculty of Medicine was a two-story wooden Western-style structure painted blue, containing the previously mentioned bathhouse. Retracing their path straight back along the flowerbed-flanking outer corridor they had just traversed—through the long central hallway bisecting the building’s core—they reached what seemed to be a prison entrance’s imposing iron-clad door... In the moment they registered its presence, the door groaned open under some unseen guard’s hand—someone who appeared to have been watching their approach from hidden quarters—and the two emerged into a dark, cavernous entranceway.

The entrance door was tightly shut, likely because it was still early morning. Guided by the faint bluish light seeping through the transom above it, they clattered up the steep left staircase of the two flanking both sides. Upon turning right at the top, they found themselves in a brilliantly bright south-facing corridor lined with rooms on the right bearing wooden plaques marked "Laboratory" and "Library." At the corridor's far end stood a brownish door affixed with a blank sheet of paper where bold brushstrokes declared: "Strictly No Entry... Dean of the Faculty of Medicine."

Dr. Wakabayashi, leading the way, took out a large key with a wooden tag from his inner pocket and opened the door. After turning around and ushering me in, he ceremoniously removed his overcoat and hung it on the wall-mounted coatrack beside the door. Following his example, I arranged my speckled overcoat and angular student cap alongside his. The persistence of our shoe prints on the floor suggested the entire room lay under a fine pall of dust.

It was a strikingly spacious, bright room. Of twelve windows arranged four each along northern, western, and southern walls, those on the north and west—all eight—were completely veiled by deep green pine branches, while the four southern windows stood unobstructed. Through these poured a flood of dazzling light from the vivid blue morning sky alongside the nearby roar of waves, streaming in with blinding intensity. Within this space stood Dr. Wakabayashi’s extraordinarily tall and slender morning-coated figure beside my own stunted uniformed form—a strange contrast laid bare before us—evoking the sensation that we had drifted far from the real world into some distant realm.

At that moment, Dr. Wakabayashi raised his slender right hand and swept it around the room in a pointing motion. Simultaneously, a frail voice emanating from some high place produced a lingering reverberation that gently filled every corner of the chamber.

“This room originally served dual purposes as both the library and specimen room for this psychiatry department. The books and specimens were all painstakingly collected by Dr. Saito Juhachi—the former head professor of this psychiatry department—comprising psychiatric research materials, reference documents, works created by patients who resided in this hospital, or personal items and records related to their circumstances. Among them are not a few specimens worthy of pride in the global academic community.” “However, after Dr. Saito’s passing, when Dr. Masaki assumed the position of head professor this February—deeming this room brighter and more suitable—he transferred all library materials that had occupied this eastern half to the former professor’s office, then remodeled the vacated space into his own living quarters as you can see here, even installing that splendid fireplace.” “Moreover, when it came to light that this had been done without obtaining the president’s approval or submitting proper documentation, Administrative Officer Tsukae at headquarters was thrown into such consternation that he reportedly came begging in obsequious terms—urgently requesting they file the necessary notice—but at that time, Dr. Masaki dismissed him without substantive reply, instead remarking as follows:”

“Oh... There’s no need for such concern.” “It’s merely a slight rearrangement of the specimens’ positions.” “Just tell the president that… that’s all there is to it.” “Listen well.” “What can I say—this concerns none other than myself. Thanks to such tendencies, I’ve managed to secure my position here as a university professor… yet in all honesty, upon reflection, I must admit I’m undoubtedly a research maniac—nay, a megalomaniac.” “I’ve thoroughly diagnosed myself as being fully qualified to serve as research material for any psychiatrist worth their salt… But even so, I can’t very well step forward now and check myself into my own hospital ward, can I?” “It merely means I wished to display my own brain matter here alongside these reference materials—as a living specimen. …Of course, in fields like internal medicine or surgery, there may be no need for such things. But in psychiatry alone, even the department chair’s brain must be treated as research material… subjected to thorough study… Such is my own brand of academic rigor, so there’s no helping it.” “I’m sure Dr. Saito—who created this specimen room—would wholeheartedly agree from his grave…”

“With that, he burst into uproarious laughter, and even the seasoned Administrative Officer Tsukae was left utterly baffled and had to retreat, or so I’ve heard.” Dr. Wakabayashi’s explanation had been delivered in an utterly flat, smooth tone—yet even so, it was more than sufficient to strike terror into my heart. In that instant when I perceived the true audacity of Dr. Masaki’s intellect—which until now I had only heard described through adjectives—now radiantly manifesting from such seemingly innocuous humor, I was made to shudder involuntarily. Not only did it transcend the common sense and rules so cherished by society at large—it was through his mindset, which treated even himself as little more than a madman’s specimen, albeit half-jokingly—that the sheer transparency of his intellect… the acrid sharpness of its irony, its greatness… became unmistakably clear to me, leaving me standing agape in stunned silence, utterly unable to close my gaping mouth.

However, Dr. Wakabayashi—as was his custom—continued speaking without regard to my astonishment. “…Now then… The purpose of bringing you to this room is none other than—as I briefly mentioned earlier in Cell Seven downstairs—first and foremost wishing to test which item among these specimens and reference materials arrayed here most profoundly captures your attention.” “This constitutes a method to probe the human subconscious—that is, to unearth memories buried too deeply for ordinary recollection. Moreover, it has been proven innumerably that this subconscious ceaselessly operates unnoticed by the individual, exerting profound control over them. Thus we may reasonably conclude that your past memories—sealed within your own subconscious—will inevitably guide you toward some memento of your former self displayed here, vividly awakening those recollections… Dr. Masaki once acquired this technique during his Balkan Peninsula travels from a local female prayer master called an Ismera, with whom he repeatedly achieved experimental success… Of course, should you prove completely unrelated to the young lady in question—to be utter strangers—this experiment would assuredly fail.” “The reason being—there exist no mementos here capable of awakening your past memories… Therefore it matters not what you choose—simply ask about whatever catches your eye in this room, one item after another.” “Adopt the mindset of one conducting psychiatric research… Proceed thus, and before long you will come to realize—with lightning clarity—a connection to one particular item.” “This shall serve as the initial hint to awaken your memories, from which point you will likely recall every last recollection in one sweeping torrent—so it shall come to pass.”

Dr. Wakabayashi’s words had flowed out with the same extreme casualness as before, smooth and effortless. Delivered with the kind-hearted simplicity of an adult explaining things to a child... Yet as I listened, I found myself unable to suppress a new kind of terror—unfelt since morning—welling up from the depths of my heart. All the doubts I had nurtured until now—that everything might be sheer nonsense—were utterly overturned from their very foundations as I listened to Dr. Wakabayashi’s explanation.

Dr. Wakabayashi was indeed an authority among forensic scholars. Even if he had truly acknowledged me as her lover, he wasn’t attempting to force that belief upon me in the slightest. Through the most impartial and upright—yet simultaneously most circuitous—scientific methods, he sought to envelop my psyche without leaving a single chink, compelling me to point directly at myself with my own hand as her lover. The profound depth of his conviction…the glacial composure of his design…its meticulous thoroughness…

...If that were the case... then could all those various events I had been witnessing and hearing since earlier actually be matters connected to my own life? And was that girl truly my legitimate cousin and simultaneously my betrothed?... ...If that were indeed true, then whether I willed it or not, I would bear the responsibility of unearthing mementos of my own past from within this room—for her sake. Thus I stood there now, destined to awaken my buried memories through this act and thereby rescue her from madness.

……Ah…. That I must excavate "my own past" from within this "madhouse specimen room"... That I must unearth proof of betrothal to a peerless beauty—who feels like a complete stranger—from among these "psychiatric research materials"... What a preposterous position I find myself in! How humiliating... how dreadful... what an unfathomable destiny this is. As these thoughts transformed within me, I unconsciously mopped the sweat beading on my brow with a fresh handkerchief from my pocket, then timidly began surveying the room’s interior anew. With a grotesque fancy taking root deep in my heart—that some unforeseen past incarnation of myself might be crouching just beyond my twitching nostrils—I cautiously peered about the chamber once more, this terror constricting my very being as I looked around.

The western half of the room, divided north-south from the center, had ordinary wooden flooring, with rows of glass-door cabinets filled with specimen-like items lining the space; conversely, the eastern half’s floor was entirely covered in linoleum dusted with a thin layer of gray, at whose center lay a large desk—appearing roughly four to five shaku wide and two ken long—flanked midway by two swivel armchairs. The green baize stretched taut across the desk’s surface—equally dust-filmed—dazzlingly reflected the light streaming through southern windows, as though intensifying the chamber’s solemn atmosphere. At the center of that emerald glare lay several document bundles clamped between canvas-backed boards and a blue square merino cloth package, all arranged with ceremonial precision. Yet seeing how a mantle of gray dust identical to the desk’s coating smothered them, these items appeared long abandoned, untouched by human hands. Before them sat a single red Seto-ware daruma ashtray, similarly dust-shrouded—its hairy arms crossed above its head and mouth gaping in perpetual yawn as it turned away from the documents. The uncanny deliberateness of its placement gnawed at my mind.

The eastern wall standing directly opposite the red daruma was entirely coated in a fresh eggshell hue that appeared newly painted, its center occupied by a large fireplace spacious enough to comfortably accommodate a person, fitted with a black-lacquered square cover. Directly above it hung a large round clock measuring over two shaku in diameter, yet it showed the current time—7:42—without emitting any ticking sounds whatsoever. Judging by this, it was likely electrically powered or something of that nature. To the right hung a large gilt-framed oil painting panel, while on the left hung a large enlarged photographic portrait enclosed in a black frame alongside a calendar. To the left of that photographic portrait hung yet another door—likely leading to an adjacent room—and all these elements, bathed in a refreshing morning light that alternately dazzled and sharply illuminated them, coalesced into a scene of solemn silence befitting a university professor’s study. As I surveyed this panorama, I found myself instinctively wanting to straighten my collar.

In truth... at that moment, I felt struck by a certain sublime inspiration. All listless resignation I had harbored until then and my curiosity toward her fate had utterly vanished... Filled with a sacred sense that all things followed Heaven’s decree, I adjusted my stiff collar with both hands. Then, with the solemn determination of a pilgrim guided by fate’s mysterious hand, I slowly stepped forward and entered the rows of cabinets displaying reference materials.

I first approached the cabinets lined near the brightest southern window, but inside the glass doors facing that window were various strange documents and scroll-like items, each affixed with a paper bearing a brief explanation. According to Dr. Wakabayashi’s explanation, all such items were those submitted by inpatients to the chief professor with the message “My mind has healed sufficiently now, so please discharge me”—or so the story went.

A Hina doll hanging scroll drawn with blood from the gums—(created by a women’s university graduate) ――A Proposal for the Conquest of Mars―― (submitted by an elementary school teacher) ――"Bamboo Lodge Retreat" from the Tang Poetry Anthology: Five-Character Quatrain in Clerical Script―― (Calligraphy executed by an illiterate farmer who, after falling ill, reproduced through transgenerational subconscious inheritance the handwriting of his great-grandfather—a Chinese-style physician) ――Dozens of sheets of Western-style paper bearing memorized transcriptions of dozens of pages from the Encyclopædia Britannica―― (Submitted by a university student disqualified from the Higher Civil Service Examination) ――Dozens of student notebooks filled cover to cover with endless repetitions of “How lovely Katyusha is, how bitter our parting”―― (self-proclaimed “creative work” by an unemployed actor styling himself a grand artist)

――A pocket sundial made of paper―― (crafted by an elderly barber) ――A Virgin Mary statue carved into a red brick with bamboo splinters―― (created by an elementary school principal who believes in Catholicism)

――Kannon statue solidified with boogers, encased in glass box――（created by Soto Sect missionary） I found myself confronted by such an unrelenting procession of pitiful, agonizing exhibits that I instinctively turned my face away before finishing the entire row—only to abruptly discover, in the broken corner of the cabinet’s glass door at the very end, a peculiar object set slightly apart from the other displayed items. At first glance, it was an inconspicuous item that had only barely caught my eye thanks to the broken glass—but the more I looked, the stranger this exhibit appeared.

It was a bound sheaf of manuscript paper stacked about six inches high, appearing to have been read by a considerable number of people, with the top few sheets torn, soiled, and beginning to fray. Careful not to injure myself on the broken glass edges, I inserted my hand and examined them closely. They were divided into five volumes in total, each first page stamped with large red Arabic numerals—I, II, III, IV, V—occupying an entire page. When I flipped through the half-torn first page of the topmost volume, I found something resembling a waka poem written horizontally in densely packed red-ink katakana in notebook-style formatting.

Opening Poem

Fetus, oh fetus, why do you leap? Mother’s Is it because you understand the mother’s heart that you tremble? On the next page, written in black-ink Gothic typeface, was the title *Dogura Magura*, but the author’s name was absent. The very first line appeared to begin with a sequence of katakana reading *Buun... nnn... nnnn...*, but judging by how the final line also concluded with the same katakana sequence—*Buun... nnn... nnnn...*—it seemed the entire work might form one continuous novel-like narrative. A voluminous manuscript with a mockingly derisive air, redolent of the madhouse.

“What is this, Doctor… this ‘Dogura Magura’…”

Dr. Wakabayashi nodded from behind me in an unusually casual manner.

“Yes. “That is yet another peculiar and fascinating creation expressing the unfathomable psychological state of a mental patient.” “Shortly after the passing of our department’s chief, Dr. Masaki, a young university student patient also confined in this affiliated ward wrote this in one frenzied burst and submitted it to me…”

“A young university student…” “That’s correct.” “Haa... So... was this written with the intent of proving his mind was sound—a plea to be discharged, as it were?”

“No—as that particular point remains unclear—I must confess I find myself struggling to categorize it—in essence, this content could be described as a sort of... extraordinary science fiction tale modeled after Dr. Masaki and myself, if you will.” “...An extraordinary science fiction tale... modeled after you and Dr. Masaki...” “Indeed...” “Isn’t this a thesis...?” “Indeed... That particular point remains rather difficult to articulate... While it is said that the writings of mental patients generally tend toward excessive logic, this work alone is of a unique nature.” “In other words, it appears entirely consistent as an academic thesis while also leaving an impression unlike any detective novel previously encountered in both form and content.” “Yet conversely, one might interpret it as nothing more than a meaningless farce written solely to mock and manipulate the intellects of Dr. Masaki and myself—a text of utterly bizarre composition. Moreover, the factual content contained within is itself extraordinarily peculiar, structured in a profoundly disorienting manner where scientific curiosity, grotesquery, eroticism, detective fiction tropes, nonsensical humor, and occult mysticism overlap at 100 percent density across every corner of its pages. When read with calm attention, one cannot help but feel that a disturbingly supernatural aura permeates the entire work—an atmosphere only producible by a mentally deranged individual.” “Of course—as this was recognized as something entirely different in nature from documents like the *Proposal for the Conquest of Mars* or anything of that sort—possessing significant research value in mental science—we had it stored here for the time being. Though I daresay even within this room... No—” “...I daresay it may well be the most peculiar reference specimen in all of psychiatric academia worldwide...”

Dr. Wakabayashi appeared determined to have me read this manuscript and began explaining with growing eloquence. The abnormal fervor of his enthusiasm made me involuntarily blink rapidly.

“Huh. How could such a young madman devise such a complex, difficult plot?” “...That is how matters stand. That young student was a prodigy who had consistently ranked first from his first year of elementary school through high school graduation until entering this university. However, owing to his intense passion for detective novels and his conviction that the future of the genre lay in psychology, psychoanalysis, and mental science, he appears to have developed mental abnormalities—ultimately staging a shocking tragedy through self-induced hallucinations and delusions.” “And so, shortly after being confined to this psychiatric ward, he apparently felt compelled to write a blood-curdling tale modeled after himself... Yet despite this novel’s structure being—as I mentioned earlier—extraordinarily complex and meticulous, its central plot proves astonishingly simple.” “In other words, it merely details the suffering endured by that young man—imprisoned in this hospital room for Dr. Masaki and myself—as he underwent unimaginably horrifying mental science experiments.”

“...Hmm... Doctor, do you possess such memories?” Under Dr. Wakabayashi’s eyes gathered the same ironic, lonely smile-wrinkles as before. They caught the backlight from the window, shining white and twitching faintly. “Such a thing absolutely does not exist.” “So it’s all nonsense then?” “However, when examining the factual content written here, one finds nothing but meticulously coherent accounts—utterly impossible to regard as nonsense.”

“Huh... “How strange...” “Could such a thing be possible?” “Well… Truthfully, I find myself uncertain on that very point as well… But if you were to read it yourself, you would understand…” “No. “I don’t have to read it, but is the content interesting?” “Well… That aspect too proves somewhat difficult to explain, but at the very least, it seems to evoke in specialists an interest so profound that the term ‘interesting’ falls utterly short of capturing it, you see.” “Even for non-specialists with some degree of scientific interest in matters like mental illness or brain physiology—or those possessing mystical inclinations toward such subjects—it appears to hold considerable fascination.” “In fact, even among the specialists at this university, those who have read it are made to reread it at least two or three times.” “And they say that just as they finally grasp the entire structure, they realize their own brain is on the verge of madness.” “In extreme cases, there’s even one individual who, after reading this manuscript, grew so disgusted with psychiatric research that they transferred to my Forensic Medicine Department, and another individual who—likewise after reading it—lost all faith in their own brain’s functions and threw themselves under a train in what they called ‘railway salvation.’”

“Huh.” “That’s one hell of a story.” “A sane person being outdone by a madman, huh.” “So it’s filled with some truly lunatic stuff, huh.”

“However, its content is depicted with such clinical detachment and logical rigor that it surpasses ordinary academic papers or novels. Moreover, I find myself newly astonished by the mentally disturbed’s remarkable capacity for recalling seen and heard details—what you witnessed earlier in the *Memorization Notes of the Encyclopedia Britannica* doesn’t even come close. Furthermore, as I mentioned, its structural uncanniness transcends what ordinary people deem reasoning or imagination. As you read it, your mind becomes ensnared in peculiar hallucinations, delusions, and warped perceptions before you realize it. It’s precisely this quality that likely inspired its title...”

“So… this title ‘Dogura Magura’ was given by the person himself, then?” “Indeed… It is truly a peculiar title, but…” “...What does it mean... The true meaning of this term ‘Dogura Magura’... Is it Japanese, or...” “Well… Regarding that matter as well, I found myself thoroughly perplexed. In short, I can only conclude that this entire text—from its title to its contents—has been systematically constructed to bewilder its readers.” “...The reason I say this is none other than...” “Having finished reading this manuscript, I found myself so bewildered by its mysterious content that I began to suspect whether the key to solving this enigmatic puzzle might lie hidden within its title.” “It is because I considered that this ‘Dogura Magura’ might be a cryptic term with such implications.” “However, the young patient who wrote this—after unleashing the manic energy unique to mental patients to complete the manuscript in just about a week without sleep or rest—appeared thoroughly exhausted and began sleeping around the clock with a loud snoring sound, rendering it impossible to inquire about the title’s meaning for some time.” “However, as such a peculiar term could not be found in any dictionary or similar resource, and its etymology remained entirely unclear, I found myself at an impasse for a time—until I unexpectedly noticed something intriguing.” “Originally, it appears that this Kyushu region retains numerous dialects containing old European-derived corrupted terms such as *Geren*, *Haraiso*, *Banko*, *Dontaku*, and *Teremparen*. Thus, I came to consider whether [the title] might be one such term, and upon having a dedicated researcher specializing in these dialects conduct various investigations, we finally arrived at an understanding.” “…This term *Dogura Magura* was reportedly a dialect from the Nagasaki region that, until around the Meiji Restoration, referred to the phantom magic used by Christian missionaries. Today, it has become a nearly obsolete term used only to mean magic tricks or simple tricks.” “While its etymology and linguistic lineage have not yet been determined, scholars posit that if one were to forcibly translate it into modern terms, it could be rendered as ‘phantom magic’ or assigned kanji such as ‘hall-whirling eye-dazzling’ or ‘door-bewildering face-devouring’—all of which may still be read phonetically as *Dogura Magura*. In any case, there is no doubt that it is a term encompassing all such meanings.” “…In short, because the content of this manuscript is thoroughly imbued—from start to finish—with such grotesque implications, bluntly erotic elements, exhaustively detective-novel-esque structures, and nonsensical absurdities stretching endlessly… a kind of cerebral hell… or rather, tricks akin to a psychological labyrinthine game… it is reasonable to conclude that such a name was bestowed.”

“...The brain’s hell... *Dogura Magura*... I still don’t quite understand... What on earth is it?”

“...That—were I to recount the matters documented within this manuscript—you might attain some measure of comprehension.” "In other words, every issue chronicled within this *Dogura Magura* narrative constitutes, without exception, phenomena that defy dismissal by common reason—readily graspable yet profoundly compelling—while simultaneously being facts rooted in manifestations of abyssal truths that might well be termed common sense surpassing common sense, science transcending science." “For instance,”

...a phrase from a madman’s sutra that searingly chants how “the mental hospital is this world’s living hell”... ...“a transcribed lecture by a mental scientist proving that ‘every last person on earth is mentally ill’”... ...an academic treatise on the grand nightmare of universal evolution starring a fetus as its protagonist... ...“a mental patient’s lecture transcript that definitively declares ‘the brain is merely a telephone exchange’”... ...what resembled a will drafted half in jest...

...a decaying image of a dead beauty painted by a master artisan of the Tang Dynasty... ...investigation documents detailing the cruelty, adultery, unspeakable acts of violence, and murder unconsciously committed by a beautiful youth—adored by a modern beauty said to be the living replica of that decaying beauty during her lifetime—... ...These elements—intertwined with various inexplicable events—appeared before you like a kaleidoscope, seemingly unrelated to the main narrative. Yet upon finishing your reading, you realized every single word and phrase had become an utterly vital part of that very narrative... Not only that, but when tracing these phantasmal impressions back to their origin—the lone *tatta* chime of a clock at midnight described in the opening—and following them onward from one to the next, you inevitably returned once more to the memory of that initial midnight chime... It was akin to circling a panoramic painting of hell so vivid it felt real—recollecting the same terrors and uncanny horrors in identical sequence, repeating endlessly without respite... No escape route revealed itself anywhere. "...In other words, all these events amounted to nothing but a dream witnessed in a single startled moment by a psychiatric patient who heard the solitary chime of a clock at a certain midnight." "Moreover, the content of the dream witnessed in that single instant actually felt as though it spanned over twenty-odd hours. To explain this scientifically, it could be proven—through the truth of mental science demonstrated by *Dogura Magura*'s entirety—that the initial and final clock chimes might in fact be the same single toll from the same clock... Such was the profoundly mysterious and unfathomable nature of *Dogura Magura*'s composition." "Evidence over theory... If you were to read it yourself, you would understand immediately, but..."

As he spoke, Dr. Wakabayashi stepped forward and reached for the topmost volume.

However, I hurriedly stopped him. "No. That's enough." As I spoke, I shook both hands violently from side to side. Just hearing Dr. Wakabayashi's explanation made me feel my mind was already being ensnared by "Dogura Magura"—and simultaneously... ...If it was something written by a lunatic, it had to be ultimately meaningless anyway. It was probably just some muddled mess combining "rote memorization of encyclopedias," "Katyusha's Loveliness," and "Mars Conquest." ...The Dogura Magura I currently faced was more than enough—being forced to shoulder someone else's too would leave me feeling utterly absurd. ...Best to forget this nonsense here and now...

...Thinking this, I thrust both hands into my pockets and shook my head violently from side to side. Then, walking over to the window beside the jutting cupboard, I looked around at the photographs and chart-like materials pasted across the area, and continued pressing Dr. Wakabayashi for his explanation. That... ――Comparative Photographs of Psychiatric Patients’ Facial Expressions Before and After Onset of Illness―― ――Analysis and Comparison Chart of Food and Excretion Before and After Onset of Illness―― ...to those belonging to such unusual studies...

――Paintings Based on Hallucinations and Delusions―― ――Hysterical Women’s Spasms and Seizures Manifesting Grotesque Postures, Various Photographs―― ――Photographs of Patients’ Costumes and Disguises in Various Mental Illnesses, Categorized by Type―― They were all such excruciatingly painful kinds of things, but the sight of them haphazardly plastered across all three walls and even the sides of the cupboards resembled a uniquely grotesque exhibition. Furthermore, within the multi-tiered glass cupboards lined up beyond that were displayed…

――Comparison of an extraordinarily large brain matter specimen，a small brain matter specimen，and a normal brain matter specimen (the giant specimen having approximately twice，and the small specimen about three times，the volume of the normal one；all formalin-preserved)――

――Formalin-preserved brain matter of sexual maniacs, homicidal maniacs, paralysis patients, dwarfs, and other mentally abnormal individuals (all showing clear signs of hypertrophy, atrophy, hemorrhage, or syphilitic infection)―― ――Ghost portrait by Ōkyo that became the treasure of a family destroyed by mental illness―― ――A Muramasa tanto said to drive the household’s master to madness when polished―― ――Several pieces of whale bone that a psychiatric patient believed to be mermaid bones and peddled around―― ――Head of a black cat with gold and silver eyes that another psychiatric patient had brewed to poison an entire family――

――Same psychiatric patient’s self-severed five fingers from left hand and the straw-cutting knife used for the act――

――Cracked skull of a patient who leapt headfirst from a bed to commit suicide―― ――A pillow caressed as though it were a wife and a doll fashioned from blankets―― ――A brass pipe swallowed under the pretense of performing magic tricks―― ――Tinplate Wrenched Apart with Bare Hands―― ――Iron Bars of a Cell Twisted by a Female Patient―― ...these terrifying items were crammed together—jostling for space—alongside elegant, intricate woven goods, artificial flowers, embroideries, and other such delicate creations crafted by lunatics.

I listened to Dr. Wakabayashi’s explanations with mounting trepidation, wondering which of these items might relate to me. I kept examining these bizarre objects in growing anxiety—what if even one had some connection to me? Yet whether by fortune or misfortune, none seemed relevant. Instead, the raw wills and emotions peculiar to psychiatric patients contained within these things pressed intensely upon my nerves one after another, creating an indescribably painful and distressing sensation.

Struggling hard to endure these feelings while gripped by something resembling a sense of duty, I peered into the cupboards—but once I'd finally finished surveying everything through sheer effort and emerged beside the large desk again, I involuntarily let out a sigh of relief. I wiped the fresh sweat oozing out on my forehead with a handkerchief. Then, suddenly pivoting on my heel, I turned my back to the west. ...At the same moment, all the items in the room swung around in a half-circle from right to left, and the framed oil painting hung near the entrance on my right slid past the central desk to come to an exact halt directly before me. As though I had been destined to face that framed painting...

I stretched my hunched-over body forcefully. Then anew, taking a long, long deep breath, I found myself captivated by the blend of yellow, brown, and faded green in those timeworn oil paints.

The scene appeared to depict a Western burning at the stake or something of that nature. In the center of three thick greenwood pillars arranged in a row, a venerable old man with white hair and a white beard was bound high up. To his right, an emaciated pale youth… and on the old man’s left, a disheveled woman crowned with a floral wreath—each bound completely naked—choked and writhed in the flames and smoke rising from the pile of firewood stacked beneath their feet. From the right side of the frame viewing this horrific spectacle, a noble-looking couple riding a golden palanquin—surrounded by gorgeously attired relatives and what appeared to be retainers—gazed with apparent fascination and composure. In stark contrast, on the opposite left edge, a single child yearning for his mother—whose face emerged from flames and smoke—reached out with both hands, crying frantically. A burly man resembling a father and an elderly man resembling a grandfather embraced [the child], pressing their large hands over his mouth while turning back with expressions as though fearing the nobles—each detail rendered in vivid clarity.

And there in the very center of the square stood a lone tall-nosed crone wearing a red triangular hood and a long black coat, leaning on her T-shaped cane as she gleefully pointed out the three figures’ agony on the stakes to the nobles—baring all her coarse teeth in a leering grin… It was an ominously vivid scene that grew increasingly unsettling the longer one looked. "What is this painting?"

I pointed at the painting and turned around. Dr. Wakabayashi answered coldly, just as he had been doing all along, with both hands still in his trouser pockets. "That is an illustration of superstitions practiced in medieval Europe—judging from the customs depicted, likely from France or thereabouts." "It shows a scene where those deemed mentally ill—branded as demon-possessed—were burned indiscriminately. The old woman at center wearing a red hood and black coat was a witch who served as physician, prayer leader, and diviner of that era." "Dr. Masaki reportedly acquired this from an antique shop in Yanagawa as reference material demonstrating how madmen were treated with such cruelty in the past." "Recently, two or three individuals have emerged claiming Rembrandt as the painter—if true, this would make the work extraordinarily valuable as both art and artifact..."

“...Haa... So burning them alive was the treatment method of that era, I see.” “Indeed, indeed.” “Since there exists no medicine for an elusive illness like mental illness, it should rather be termed a thorough treatment method.” I felt unable to laugh or cry. As he spoke these words and looked down at me, Dr. Wakabayashi’s pallid eyes contained a chilling cruelty—the sort that might seize me this very moment and turn me to charcoal in the name of academic pursuit... I said while wiping my face with my palm, as though offering a greeting.

“How fortunate are today’s madmen.”

Then, once again, something like a smile appeared on Dr. Wakabayashi’s left cheek—only to vanish immediately. “No—it’s not necessarily so. Or perhaps those psychiatric patients of old who were burned to death under a single-minded conviction were happier after all.” I hunched my shoulders, once again regretting having said something unnecessary. While avoiding Dr. Wakabayashi’s unsettling gaze, I wiped my face with a handkerchief—when unexpectedly, a large photograph in a black wooden frame hanging on the wall directly to my left caught my eye.

It showed a portly gentleman around sixty years old in crested formal attire—his forehead receding high up, a long salt-and-pepper beard hanging down—with an exceedingly gentle, good-natured smile filling his entire face. When I first noticed that photograph, thinking it might be Dr. Masaki, I deliberately went to stand directly in front of it and faced it properly—but somehow feeling it wasn’t him after all, I turned back to Dr. Wakabayashi again.

“Who is this person in the photograph?” Dr. Wakabayashi’s face appeared to soften remarkably the moment I posed this question. For some reason beyond my understanding, he slowly lowered his head while displaying a radiance resembling satisfaction unlike anything before. “……Yes……that photograph.” “Yes……that is Dr. Saito Juhachi.” “As I mentioned briefly earlier, he was the one who oversaw this psychiatry department before Dr. Masaki, and our esteemed mentor.”

As he spoke these words, Dr. Wakabayashi let out a faint, sentimental sigh—but soon, his elongated face now showing deep emotion, he began approaching me with measured steps.

“...It has finally caught your eye.” “Wh—” I looked up at Dr. Wakabayashi’s face in surprise. Because I didn’t understand the meaning of his words… Yet Dr. Wakabayashi paid no heed, continuing to approach me with measured composure. Leaning forward slightly from the waist, he compared my face to the photograph before resuming his words in an even graver, more meticulous tone. “I am stating that this photograph has finally caught your attention.” “The reason being that none other than this photograph is undoubtedly most deeply connected to your past life…”

The moment these words were spoken, I jolted to awareness. I remembered having forgotten the initial purpose for which I had entered this room. And at that very moment, I felt a faint yet profound palpitation deep within my heart. Yet at the same time, when I considered the state of my own mind—still devoid of any true recollection—I found myself caught between relief and disappointment, letting out a sigh as I shrugged once. And so, inclining my head slightly, I listened to Dr. Wakabayashi's words.

“...The past memories lying dormant within you—I perceive they have been awakening ever so subtly from the very beginning.” “It can only be concluded that your own subconscious—stirred awake as you viewed that madman-burning scene from the *Dogura Magura* manuscript—has now guided you to stand before this photograph.” “For the one who displayed both that infamous painting of madmen being burned and Dr. Saito’s portrait here side by side was none other than—” “—the experimenter of your mental consciousness: Dr. Masaki himself.” “...Dr. Masaki grew incensed at how even in this twentieth century, psychiatric patients continue to endure cruel and inhuman treatment—the very atrocities depicted in that painting—carried out everywhere as an open secret... This outrage led him to devote his life to mental illness research...” “And thus, through Dr. Saito’s esteemed guidance and support, he ultimately attained his goal...”

“The burning of madmen… Is the massacre of madmen still being carried out even now?”

I muttered as if talking to myself. Once again seized by bottomless terror... Yet Dr. Wakabayashi nodded calmly. "...They are being carried out." "They are being carried out as thoroughly as in bygone days." "No." "Atrocities surpassing burning at the stake are being brazenly conducted in mental hospitals across the world, I must inform you." "Even now, at this very moment..." "Th... That’s too—"

I started to say but swallowed my words. Because I thought it was too cruel a way of putting things… However, Dr. Wakabayashi remained unfazed. Standing shoulder-to-shoulder with me and comparing the oil painting of madmen being burned and Dr. Saito’s photograph, he informed me in a dispassionate tone. “It is not too much.” “It is undoubtedly an indisputable fact.” “The fact will become clear to you in due course, I believe, but as a result of Dr. Masaki’s tremendous efforts to save the masses of pitiful madmen suffering such abuse, he ultimately came to establish an unprecedented new theory in mental science.” “The principles of this astonishing new theory—as I briefly mentioned earlier—are of an exceedingly accessible kind, so straightforward that even women and children could comprehend them, yet profoundly intriguing… It was to empirically demonstrate these theoretical principles that [Dr. Masaki] initiated the ‘Madman Liberation’ experiment… However… Moreover, this experiment has now been impeccably completed through none other than your own gracious provision… All that remains is a single task: for you to recover your past memories and proceed to affix your signature to the experimental documentation—a formality now perfectly arranged.”

I became dumbfounded once again. With my mouth still hanging open, I looked up at the profile of Dr. Wakabayashi standing beside me. And so I—bound by an indescribably solemn, terrifying fate—felt myself being drawn into this room, maneuvered into immobility as I faced the two frames that had forged this fate... However, Dr. Wakabayashi continued speaking smoothly, remaining utterly detached from these feelings of mine.

“...Therefore, when I explain the causal relationship between Dr. Saito and Dr. Masaki regarding that burning of madmen, every aspect of the account will touch upon your own past history.” “That is to say—how meticulously Dr. Masaki prepared before coming to Kyushu University to subject you to a mental science experiment at the liberation therapy facility… what dreadful hardships and efforts he expended in preparing and researching for this experiment...”

“Wh— Wh—” “To experiment on me… such terrifying preparations…” “Indeed, Dr. Masaki devoted over twenty long years to preparing for this experiment.”

“...Twenty years...” The voice that had begun to cry out turned into something like a stifled groan before fully forming, recoiling into my throat. It felt as though those twenty years of Dr. Masaki’s meticulous preparations were coiling around my neck... This time, Dr. Wakabayashi appeared to perceive my state and nodded slowly once more. “Correct.” “Dr. Masaki had been preparing this experiment for you since before your very birth.”

“For me… before I was even born…” “Indeed.” “When I say this, you may think I am resorting to deliberately eccentric phrasing, but I assure you that is not at all the case.” “Dr. Masaki had indeed anticipated your present circumstances from long before you were even born.” “Once you have recovered your past memories—no… even if you do not recall your past memories at all—it would suffice if you merely deduce your own name through the facts I shall provide henceforth.” “Once you have cross-checked the surrounding facts, I believe you will be able to acknowledge that what I am stating is in no way an exaggeration, but rather an unvarnished fact… Furthermore… I am convinced that proceeding in this manner constitutes the supreme—indeed, the ultimate—means by which you may truly recollect your own name…”

Dr. Wakabayashi returned to the front of the large desk while continuing his explanation, then turned back toward me as he pointed at a small swivel chair facing the stove. I approached the chair like a patient obeying surgical orders and managed to lower myself hesitantly into it, yet felt not the slightest sensation of actually sitting down. Pressing a hand to my chest—now breathless from the eeriness and strangeness—I could only keep swallowing saliva over and over.

In the meantime, Dr. Wakabayashi circled all the way around the large desk and sat down in the large swivel chair opposite me. He had curled up small in the same posture I had previously seen in Cell #7, but this time, having removed his overcoat, his morning coat-clad arms and legs were exposed—long and bent at sharp angles—while his elongated neck and slender torso could be seen slowly retracting into themselves. And because only his face remained its former size, fixed at the very center, the overall impression took on an unearthly quality. It transformed into something akin to a giant spider with a large, pale human face—dressed in a morning coat—that had just crawled out from the massive fireplace behind it to make me its prey.

When I saw that, I instinctively straightened my posture in the swivel chair. Then that giant spider-like Dr. Wakabayashi leisurely extended his long arm, pulled closer what appeared to be a bound bundle of documents that had been left untouched in the center of the large desk since earlier, gently brushed dust from beneath his knee, and let out a couple of small coughs.

“Now then, regarding the account of how Dr. Masaki staked his life to complete that experiment—I must humbly beg your pardon, but in order to relate this matter, I find it necessary to invoke my own role in these events… The reason for this is none other than—” “Dr. Masaki and I hail from the same hometown in Chiba Prefecture. When the predecessor of this university—then called Kyoto Imperial University, Fukuoka Medical College—was newly established in Meiji 36 [1903] through the renovation of Fukuoka Prefectural Hospital, we sat side by side as members of its inaugural entering class.” “Then, having graduated together in Meiji 40 [1907], it would be apt to say we were classmates—indeed, fellow alumni.” “Moreover, until this very day, the two of us have remained bachelors, devoting our lives entirely to academic research—in these respects, we were exactly alike… However, when it came to Dr. Masaki’s extraordinary intellect and the immensity of his personal fortune, these lay utterly beyond anything we could conceive.” “To speak solely of academic matters first, our research in those days required us to exert every possible effort because foreign books could not be obtained as freely as they are today.” “While we would borrow books from the school library and copy them day and night, Dr. Masaki alone remained utterly carefree—even books he had ordered from abroad at his own expense would be lent to others without hesitation after a single perusal.” “And he himself engaged in what one might call semi-recreational pursuits—roaming about to collect fossils of ancient organisms or investigating shrine and temple histories wholly unrelated to medicine.” “However, Dr. Masaki’s fossil collecting and shrine investigations were by no means meaningless pastimes even then.” “…they constituted deliberate and systematic work of grave significance connected to the ‘Lunatic Liberation Therapy’ experiment.” “…it is only now, twenty years later, that I have finally begun to grasp this fact, leaving me—as if newly awakened—shocked and awestruck by the unparalleled brilliance and profundity of Dr. Masaki’s intellect.” “In any case, for these reasons, Dr. Masaki had already attracted attention as an eccentric figure among students and faculty from that time onward—and yet, it would be no exaggeration to say that the first to recognize such a great mind belonged to none other than the subject of this photograph displayed here: Dr. Saito Juhachi.”

“…And this is how matters stand,” Dr. Wakabayashi continued. “Now, this Dr. Saito had been a faculty member since the university’s very founding—a man of such profound erudition that he single-handedly gathered most specimens currently housed in this room. Moreover, he was an exceptionally gifted orator; though it may be a digression, there remains an anecdote illustrative of this fact.” “On one occasion during the third anniversary celebration of our university’s establishment held in the grand auditorium, Dr. Masaki—then representing the student body—delivered an address of the following nature.”

“Lately, newspapers have been denouncing how students and professors at this university frequent pleasure quarters and indulge in gambling, but I believe these matters are entirely unworthy of concern.” “The primary crime of those who style themselves students and scholars lies neither in carousing nor dabbling in hanafuda.” “Once people obtain either a bachelor’s degree or doctorate, they abandon academic research as if forgetting it entirely.” “This I consider the greatest affliction plaguing Japan’s academic world.”

When this was proclaimed, the faces of all the students and professors in the hall underwent a dramatic change. However, among them, only Dr. Saito rose from his seat to deliver fervent applause and shout "Bravo!"—a scene I still vividly recall to this day—so this single incident alone should suffice to reveal one facet of his character.

However, when Dr. Saito first assumed his post at this university, Kyushu University had not yet established a specialized psychiatry department—indeed, no such division existed at all. At that time, Dr. Saito remained the sole psychiatry specialist within the institution, holding the rank of associate professor and overseeing only a small number of lectures. Regarding this circumstance, he appeared rather discontented. Dr. Saito would often corner his two favorites—Dr. Masaki and myself, whom he had been mentoring since those days—to rail against the omnipotence of materialist science in modern times or lament the future of the nation’s polity. Though I never knew how to respond in such moments, Dr. Masaki would always counter with some bizarrely inventive retort that left Dr. Saito utterly speechless… Among these exchanges, the words that remain most vividly in my memory were as follows:

“So—ra, here we go again with your signature brand of hackneyed complaints.” “You’re not some underpaid phonograph—why don’t you change your wax cylinder already?” “People nowadays are all obsessed with the West and hopelessly hooked on materialist science—so merely injecting your grumbles won’t be nearly enough to cure them.” “Now, now, there’s no need to get so worked up. Just wait another twenty years or so.” “In twenty years' time, it may well be that a single remarkable psychiatric patient will appear here in Japan.” “……And then this patient will meticulously record and publish—to themselves—the cause of their own illness and the process by which their mental aberration recovered, thereby astounding scholars worldwide. Simultaneously, they will utterly crush not only all that humanity has collectively built up until now—religion, morality, art, law, science—but also naturalism, nihilism, anarchism, and every other materialist cultural ideology. In their place, this madman will begin clamoring to hammer out upon this earth a mental culture of unparalleled exhilaration—one that liberates the human soul to its naked core down to the utter depths.” “……When that Madman Professor’s uproar comes to pass exactly as planned and succeeds splendidly, Mental Science will rise to become the supreme discipline on this earth, just as you desire.” “At the same time, schools that treat their psychiatry departments like unwanted stepchildren—as this university does—will become utterly worthless.” “So look forward to that, and do your utmost to live long while waiting.” “Scholars have no retirement age, you know.”

"I recall it being something along those lines—even Dr. Saito appeared utterly dumbfounded by this... And I, who had been listening alongside him, was no less astonished. First and foremost, we couldn't even determine whether Dr. Masaki had truly meant those prophetic statements... How could anyone back then have imagined that Dr. Masaki had already been scheming at that very moment to personally create such a psychiatric patient to shock academia?... Moreover, since Dr. Masaki had never refrained from startling people with such preposterous remarks even in those days—indeed, it was hardly unusual—neither Dr. Saito nor I harbored any particular suspicions about the matter, nor did we think to probe him with deeper questions."

However, before long, this esteemed dissatisfaction of Dr. Saito’s—combined with Dr. Masaki’s genius intellect—would come to stir up an extraordinary upheaval within the university at that time. “It had its origins precisely at the time when we were graduating from this university—when Dr. Masaki presented his extraordinary research titled *Fetal Dreams* as his graduation thesis.” “……A fetus… Does a fetus dream?” With that, I suddenly let out a shrill voice. The phrase 'fetal dreams' had struck my ears with such an uncanny resonance... yet... Dr. Wakabayashi remained utterly unfazed. He nodded as though my surprise was only natural. He carefully spread out each sheet of the documents he held, peering at them with pale eyes...

“...Precisely so... While the contents of what is called *Fetal Dreams* will in due course come before your eyes, even merely glancing at its title makes clear this is no ordinary academic paper.” “Even ordinary dreams seen by ordinary people remain poorly understood to this day—let alone a thesis titled as such, dating back twenty years...to an era when you were either newly born or not yet born. Yet this was chosen as an academic research paper’s title. Moreover, given that Dr. Masaki’s intellect had long been renowned as extraordinary, this thesis’s title instantly became the talk of the entire university—to such a degree that there was no one who did not widen their eyes in astonishment at what its contents might be.”

“……Now then, when this thesis was set to undergo review by all professors in accordance with university regulations at the time, its style—utterly breaking from conventional forms—left those esteemed scholars dumbfounded.” “……The reason being that Dr. Masaki was originally amply endowed with linguistic talents—so much so that even abstruse literary works written in English, German, or French, entirely outside his specialty, were things he could effortlessly read through… a fact that had become the talk among his student peers.” “……And so naturally, his graduation thesis was expected to be written in German—then regarded as the proper academic language—but contrary to all expectations, it employed the vernacular style that had not yet gained widespread acceptance at the time, peppered with slang and regional dialects.” “Moreover, its central argument deviated so wildly from accepted norms—mocking readers as brazenly as its title did—that even these professors of the new university, though thoroughly versed in cutting-edge scholarship, found themselves utterly flustered.” “Among them, a certain professor notorious for exacting standards became so enraged that…”

“...The very fact that the president would force us to read such a frivolous paper proves his own incompetence.” “That man Masaki grows conceited about his own intellect—that’s why he dares submit such drivel without hesitation.” “The one defiling the sanctity of this university’s inaugural thesis evaluation is none other than this greenhorn Masaki.” “We should make an example of such a student by expelling him.” The rumor of his vehement ranting had even reached the student body. Of course, I believe this was likely true, but...

Under such circumstances, the entire university’s tense attention had become focused on the faculty committee meeting for evaluating graduation theses. When the day finally arrived, each professor was largely in agreement—expulsion aside, they swiftly voted to reject approving this thesis as a graduation paper outright. At that moment, Dr. Saito—who at the time had been seated at the far end of the table as the youngest faculty member—suddenly rose to his feet and delivered what would become his legendary opposing argument, still renowned even to this day.

“...I must ask you to wait a moment.” “Though I recognize the profound presumption of speaking from my seat at the far end, I must speak out—for the sake of academia, I cannot remain silent. I hold an opinion entirely opposite to all of yours regarding this thesis.” “I will now state the reasons for this.” “...First, those of you who criticize this thesis—the composition lacks proper form.” “It does not conform to the regulations.” “...These arguments being presented amount to no debate worth having—I see no need to counter them.” “Academic papers differ fundamentally in nature from petitions submitted to government offices—the sort pleading ‘Please grant me graduation’ or ‘Please award me a doctorate.’” “I maintain that a single declaration suffices: ‘No prescribed format or style exists anywhere...’”

...Next, regarding the content of this thesis—this too is absolutely not the frivolous work you have been attacking it as. "The reason this thesis’s value goes unrecognized lies in modern medical researchers remaining shackled to excessively materialistic studies of the flesh, deficient in scholarly understanding of scientific observation regarding the human spirit—that is to say, mental science." "You gentlemen remain oblivious to how mental scientists worldwide have agonized and labored to uncover fundamental research methodologies concerning mind, life, or heredity—of precisely the sort published herein." "It is for this cause that I pledge my professional honor in maintaining that this thesis’s true worth remains unapprehended."

...In other words, this thesis posits that humans experience during their ten months in the maternal womb a dream surpassing all imagination—one that could be titled *A Live Recording of Universal Evolution*, wherein the fetus itself acts as both director and protagonist of a continuous cinematic vision spanning billions of years. This phantasmagoria depicts with unerring precision not only prehistoric flora and fauna of indescribable strangeness—now fossilized—along with cataclysmic events of cosmic grandeur that annihilated them, but further traces how primitive humans emerging from those very upheavals—the fetus’s remote ancestors—through successive generations to its present parents, accumulated what misdeeds they committed in their desperate struggle for survival; how they perpetrated cruel atrocities while deceiving others’ perceptions... The thesis asserts that this supreme nightmare of horror and dread—rendering in meticulous detail from the fetus’s own subjective experience how such psychologically compounded因果(karmic) states became genetically transmitted—can be inferred through anatomical observation of human physiology and psyche. However, being neither a fact self-recorded by fetuses nor preserved in adult annals, this remains ultimately conjectural. “Therefore it possesses no academic merit.” “As a graduation thesis, it warrants zero points... and appears you gentlemen stand unanimous in this verdict.”

“……This may sound perfectly reasonable at first glance… however… I must beg your pardon, but there is one matter I should like to ask you all here.” “What I ask is this: how did you gentlemen regard *World History*—a text you undoubtedly perused at least once during your middle school years—as you read it? …That world history constitutes a record of humanity’s past, and that for the individual this equates to one’s own memories of personal history… such matters are so self-evident that to expound upon them before you now would verge on impertinence.” “As long as one possesses any semblance of a past, they could scarcely refute this.”

“...If that is so, then what dreams did so-called prehistoric humans—those who left no historical records—portray through their religion, art, and social organization? Can academic disciplines that infer—by cross-referencing extant ruins in our world—what visions these humans beheld as they evolved toward recording their own history... fields like cultural anthropology, prehistoric archaeology, or primitive archaeology... can these truly be deemed academically worthless? Could they be called unscientific? Moreover—who witnessed and recorded the geological transformations and flourishing/decline of ancient organisms documented as Earth’s pre-human history? Are we to say that geologists and paleontologists deducing such facts from terrestrial remnants are mere fabulists spinning fairy tales? Could they not be considered scientists?”

“...In other words, this thesis *Fetal Dreams* must be acknowledged as nothing less than the dawn of groundbreaking academia—one that infers the content of our unrecorded gestational dreams through countless relics embedded within and saturating every crevice of our adult bodies and minds.” “It must stand as the most cutting-edge, rigorous, and unprecedented new research.” “...Moreover, what this thesis contains regarding anatomical explanations of the human psyche’s structure constitutes a truly revolutionary endeavor—one demonstrably encompassing psychoanatomy, psychophysiology, psychopathology, and psychogenetic studies: fields mental scientists worldwide had deemed utterly impossible yet ceaselessly pursued with desperate yearning.” “Should research on *Fetal Dreams*—this work’s central subject—advance even one step further into these domains, it would likely bestow such a monumental revolution upon future human culture as to defy all measure.” “I hereby emphatically reaffirm—from my professional standpoint—that this work pioneers an entirely new path for mental science through purely scientific methodology, wholly divorced from conventional mental science’s preoccupations with ghost phenomena, mesmerism, clairvoyance, or mind-reading.”

“…I am convinced that this work, *Fetal Dreams*, though originally submitted as a student’s graduation thesis, in truth constitutes a publication of scientific value so superior and profound that it defies comparison with the commonplace doctoral dissertations of today.” “Needless to say, this work should be ranked first among this university’s inaugural graduation theses and held as a pride of our faculty; those scholars who criticize it as worthless must be individuals ignorant of historical facts—of how new academic disciplines come into being… of how great truths, at their initial presentation, have always been dismissed as products of fantasy.”

…and so on—such was the gist of his argument, as Dr. Saito later recounted to me. Now, it goes without saying that Dr. Saito’s assertions of this nature provoked antipathy among the other professors. Dr. Saito was instantly made the focal point of denunciations and attacks from all assembled professors; however, retreating not a single step, he repulsed and shattered each assault with erudite and profound arguments, so that the meeting which had commenced at three o'clock in the afternoon remained unresolved even after night fell. For this was a desperate debate centered on the highest mission and honor of our newly established medical department—truly a blood-stirring, flesh-tingling spectacle it must have been. Compelled by necessity, they postponed evaluating all other papers until the following day, lit lamps to continue their debate, and by nine o'clock that evening, were at last reduced to complete silence. At that moment, Dean Moriyama—who would later be celebrated as an illustrious university president—rendered his verdict, declaring that this work *Fetal Dreams* should be recognized as an academic research paper, thereby finally bringing that day’s meeting to a close. Thereafter, over three days—the following day, the day after that, and a third—they evaluated all sixteen theses, with the result that Dr. Masaki’s *Fetal Dreams* was ranked first among the graduation papers in accordance with Dr. Saito’s advocacy.

“But… when the day of the medical department’s graduation ceremony—already layered with mounting anticipation—finally arrived, to universal astonishment, it was discovered that Bachelor Masaki himself, who should have been present to receive the Imperial Silver Watch, had vanished without a trace, shocking all concerned once more.” “Ah.” “He disappeared on the very day of the graduation ceremony… Why would that be?” The instant these words escaped me, Dr. Wakabayashi abruptly sealed his lips for reasons unclear. He fixed his gaze upon my face as if poised to utter matters of grave consequence, yet ultimately parted his lips with even greater circumspection than before.

“As for the true cause behind Dr. Masaki’s disappearance before such a glorious opportunity, I believe no scholar has yet conceived of it to this day.” “Of course, even I do not grasp the full truth of this matter. However, one cannot deny that a causal relationship likely lurks between Dr. Masaki’s disappearance and the aforementioned thesis *Fetal Dreams*. To rephrase—we may reasonably conjecture that Dr. Masaki was compelled into hiding after being threatened by the protagonist of his own graduation thesis, *Fetal Dreams*.”

"...The protagonist of Fetal Dreams... being threatened by a fetus... I don't quite grasp it, but..." "Ah, no." "I believe it would be better if you do not come to a clear understanding at this time." Dr. Wakabayashi raised his right hand from within the chair as if to soothe me. And with that peculiar smile twitching beneath his left eye, he continued speaking in the same grave tone. "...I believe it would be better if you do not come to a clear understanding at this time." "Though it may be impertinent of me to say so, once you have fully recovered your own past memories, I trust you will come to clearly discern such underlying truths as who precisely serves as the protagonist of that horror film titled Fetal Dreams. It is for this eventual understanding that I particularly urge your attention now. ...Now then, when the inaugural graduation ceremony of our faculty concluded with Dr. Masaki's absence, a letter from him arrived at Dean Moriyama's office the following day—a missive said to contain aspirations of the following nature."

“I never imagined there could exist a person in modern scientific circles who would understand my thesis *Fetal Dreams*. Fully convinced that no such person could possibly exist, I submitted it prepared to fail; yet to my utmost astonishment, upon hearing that it had been recommended by His Excellency the Dean and Dr. Saito, I lamented at length. ‘If the value of that thesis could be so easily discerned, my research must still be woefully shallow.’ I thought that in such a state, I would be unable to perpetuate the honor of my Fukuoka University.”

"I have no honor to face Your Excellency and Dr. Saito, so I will conceal myself." "As for the Imperial Silver Watch, I humbly request that you kindly keep it in your custody for the time being." "Next time, I will surely accomplish such great research that no one can comprehend it, thereby repaying your kindness—" …and so on—such was the content of his letter. It is said that Dean Moriyama showed this letter to Dr. Saito and laughed heartily, remarking, "A man who's brazen to the core," but…

…Now, after touring Europe for exactly eight years and obtaining honorary degrees from three nations—Austria, Germany, and France—Dr. Masaki quietly returned to Japan in Taisho Year 4 [1915], whereupon he began a nomadic life without settling in any fixed residence. While visiting mental hospitals across the country and gathering research materials by investigating biographies, legends, records, genealogies, and other documents related to the lineages of psychiatric patients from various regions, he also distributed among the general populace a pamphlet titled *Madman’s Hell Heretic Ballad*.

“…Madman’s Hell… Heretic Ballad… What exactly is written in it?” “…I shall present its contents to you now, but like the earlier *Fetal Dreams*, they contain terrifying facts never before disclosed.” “To summarize, this ballad exposes both the realities of how the mentally ill are abused in modern society—as I mentioned earlier—and the inner workings of psychiatric hospitals whose sham treatments surpass prisons in horror… To rephrase it, one could call it a kind of petition or manifesto that versified the contents of the Madman’s Dark Age—those blood-chilling truths lurking beneath modern culture.” “Dr. Masaki not only extensively distributed this to government authorities, various other government offices, and schools, but he himself would strike a wooden fish, chant the verses of this Heretic Ballad, and circulate printed pamphlets of the ballad among the populace.”

“…Himself… striking a wooden fish…” “Indeed, indeed… It’s quite an eccentric tale, but for Dr. Masaki, this seems to have been an extremely serious endeavor… Moreover, regarding these undertakings of Dr. Masaki’s, there are indications that his mentor Dr. Saito maintained contact with him both overtly and covertly, offering support with the resolve to stake his own position and honor.” “However, regrettably, as the contents of this Heretic Ballad constituted too blatant an exposé of facts—appearing perhaps senseless depending on how one viewed them—it seems there were none who earnestly resonated with it, and thus it was ultimately ignored by society—truly a most regrettable state of affairs.” “Of course, one might imagine that if the facts of abuse against psychiatric patients in mental hospitals—as exposed in this Heretic Ballad—were taken seriously by society at large, every modern mental hospital would be demolished, potentially unleashing a global flood of the mentally disturbed. However, Dr. Masaki appears to have given no consideration whatsoever to such an outcome; rather, it is believed he conducted this propaganda solely as preparatory work for the future establishment of his own ‘Madman Liberation Therapy’ experiments.”

“So... it really was...”

As I began to say this, I found myself involuntarily startled and unable to remain seated without straightening up. Swallowing saliva over and over, I muttered. "So... after all... you're making preparations to subject me to the experiment..." "Indeed, indeed..."

Dr. Wakabayashi nodded without a moment’s hesitation. “As I stated earlier, Dr. Masaki’s intellect lies far beyond the limits of our comprehension; however, it is an undeniable fact that within those outlandish, grandiose actions of Dr. Masaki’s lay certain preparatory efforts toward establishing liberation therapy.” “Every single one of Dr. Masaki’s phantom-like comings and goings—which I shall now recount—appears to contain such significance. To rephrase it, we can only conclude that in the latter half of his life, Dr. Masaki orchestrated even his slightest gesture and movement around you as their central axis.”

Dr. Wakabayashi, speaking in this manner, abruptly directed his pale, cold, feeble gaze toward my face. He continued staring at my face until I could no longer remain seated; then, upon seeing that I had grown unable to move, let alone utter a reply, he withdrew a handkerchief as if shifting gears, gave a small cough, and smoothly resumed speaking.

“However, this pertains to an event from the end of March in the year Taisho 13 [1924].” “It was an incident I shall never forget—occurring around approximately 1:00 PM on the 26th.” “For eighteen long years since his graduation, Dr. Masaki had completely vanished without a trace—so when he unexpectedly knocked on the door of my office at this university’s Department of Forensic Medicine, even someone like me was utterly taken aback.” Feeling as though I had encountered a ghost, we nonetheless exchanged congratulations on his safe return—but when I inquired why he had returned so abruptly in this manner, Dr. Masaki, maintaining the same frank and open demeanor as of old and scratching his head all the while, proceeded to relate the following account.

“Ah, no.” “That’s the thing.” “To tell the truth, it’s rather embarrassing, you see.” “Two or three weeks ago at Moji Station’s ticket gate, I had the gold-cased watch I’d been carrying stolen by a pickpocket.” “It was a Mobad Company special order worth about a thousand yen—what a shame that was.” “So it suddenly occurred to me—if that silver watch I’d entrusted here eighteen years ago still existed, I figured I’d come claim it, you see? …And while I was at it, I thought I’d bring some souvenir to astonish you all, but nothing particularly splendid came to mind. So I holed up on the second floor of Moji’s Isegen Inn and dashed off some trifling paper-like thing at full speed.” “First I thought to present this to the new President and went to ask Dr. Saito for an introduction, but he said while he could make the introduction himself, given official procedures it’d be better to submit through Dean Wakabayashi’s office. That’s why I’ve hauled it over here.” “Might be troublesome, but I’d appreciate your help with this.”

“Such was his account. “Needless to say, the watch that had been kept in storage was promptly returned—but it was at this time that Dr. Masaki submitted none other than his *Brain Matter Theory*, a work which Dr. Saito had prophesied would shock the global academic world even more profoundly than Darwin’s *On the Origin of Species* or Einstein’s *Theory of Relativity*.” “…The Brain Matter Theory…” “Indeed. “Titled *Brain Matter Theory*, this approximately thirty-thousand-word thesis stood in stark contrast to the previously discussed *Fetal Dreams*, being solemn and dignified in the extreme. To prevent misinterpretation, it was written in two languages—German and Latin—yet Dr. Masaki’s intellect and vigor in completing this work within a mere two to three weeks on the second floor of an inn devoid of any reference materials must assuredly be deemed extraordinary. “Moreover, through this thesis, Dr. Masaki elucidated the brain’s mysterious functions—which until now no one had been able to explain, prove, or experiment upon—with a clarity as though reflected in a mirror. “And at the same time, he provided an exceedingly clear and straightforward explanation for the numerous bizarre phenomena that had remained unresolved questions in psychiatric academia until today. “Therefore, due to professional obligations, Dr. Saito—who was the first to review this thesis—was naturally extremely astonished, and then spent approximately a year devoting himself day and night to studying it. Finally, last year… at the end of February in Taisho 14 [1925], upon completing a thorough examination and analysis, he visited President Matsubara at his residence early the following morning,”

“…As of today, I shall retire from my professorial chair in the Kyushu University Department of Psychiatry and wish to recommend Dr. Masaki as my successor.” “If another university were to take Dr. Masaki, I believe it would bring disgrace upon this university…” …pleaded with dark tears welling in his eyes. However, as this occurred at a time when Dr. Masaki had once again vanished without disclosing his whereabouts, and President Matsubara—now profoundly admiring Dr. Saito’s character more than ever—calmed the agitated Dr. Saito while expressing hope for his continued tenure, and also tentatively decided to confer a degree upon Dr. Masaki by accepting this thesis as his doctoral dissertation… This series of events has been passed down as an admirable tale within academic circles. “However, it appears this matter was leaked by someone and reportedly published in the newspapers… Though I must confess—I carelessly failed to read that particular article…”

Dr. Wakabayashi, having reached this point in his account, seemed struck by the memory of that time; he closed his eyes quietly, as if deeply moved. I too, filled with reverence, gazed up at the portrait of Dr. Saito. Perhaps because I viewed it through such thoughts, his figure appeared godlike and noble, and I found myself letting out a soft sigh as I murmured. "So in that case, it’s as though Dr. Saito passed away in order to pass his position on to Dr. Masaki, isn’t it?"

Dr. Wakabayashi seemed to grow even more deeply moved as my question reached his ears, the furrow between his closed eyes deepening further. He let out a long, heavy sigh that seemed on the verge of erupting into a cough, but soon quietly opened his eyes and, meaningfully aligning his ashen gaze with mine, strengthened his tone.

"That is correct." "That Dr. Saito passed away suddenly last year… on October 19, Taisho 14 [1925], not long after Dr. Masaki had received his degree." "Moreover, he passed away due to unnatural causes." “An... un... unnatural death...”

I uttered a hollow sound. Stunned by the conversation's abrupt turn, I kept shifting my gaze between Dr. Wakabayashi's ashen face and Dr. Saito's smiling portrait in the frame. Why would someone of such noble character meet an unnatural death...? The doubt coiled through me.

However, Dr. Wakabayashi quietly fixed his gaze on my face, as if pressing upon me those very doubts of mine. Once again, he slightly strengthened his tone. "...That's correct." "Dr. Saito passed away due to unnatural causes." "Dr. Saito left this room around 5:00 PM on October 18 of last year—Taisho 14—after finishing his work as usual and entrusting a few tasks to the medical office staff, but he never returned to his home in Hakozaki, Amiyacho." "And then early the next morning, he was found floating as a drowned corpse on the shore behind Hakozaki Aquarium." "The discoverer was the cleaning woman at Hakozaki Aquarium. Upon receiving the urgent report, the police authorities and we rushed to investigate, which revealed he had consumed a significant amount of alcohol. Thus it was concluded he likely encountered someone intimately acquainted with him on his way home, strayed from his path after a long interval—thereby mistaking his route—and fell from that stone wall." "Of course, as you'd understand if you saw the area yourself—it's an outskirt region with sprawling garbage dumps, grasslands, and university-adjacent farmlands where none would wander unless thoroughly intoxicated." "Therefore we naturally investigated all possibilities of foul play and exhaustively examined his belongings, but found nothing missing." "Furthermore, synthesizing accounts from bereaved family and friends clarified that Dr. Saito only drank outside when invited by trusted university colleagues—all identified without exception. One could say he absolutely never drank alone beyond his evening sake at home... Moreover, whenever deeply intoxicated socially, custom dictated a companion escort him home—making this incident an inexplicable exception... Despite investigating every scenario imaginable, the area where he fell—a long breakwater stretching from Chiyomachi—yielded no footprints indicating his path or misstep." "Regardless of companions' presence—even assuming murder—we found absolutely no clues pointing to a perpetrator..."

On the other hand, considering Dr. Saito’s noble character as I have just described, it was deemed inconceivable that he could have incurred anyone’s resentment—so ultimately, his death was concluded to have been accidental.” “Dr. Saito seldom drank alcohol, but when he did become intoxicated, he would lose all sense of time and place—his sole shortcoming. It truly was a tragic loss of such an exceptional individual.” “…Has the person who drank with him still not been identified?”

“Indeed… They still have not been identified, but this is likely someone who would only step forward if they possessed an exceptionally delicate conscience.”

"But... but... if they don't come forward, they'll have to live their whole life feeling suffocated, won't they?" “From the perspective of common sense among people these days, there seems to be no need to consider matters so conscientiously… Even if they were to come forward, it wouldn’t bring Dr. Saito back from beneath his grave—it would merely result in them alone suffering unpleasant disgrace under some form of punishment, ultimately serving only to increase society’s losses… That is likely how they rationalize it… No—rather, by now they may have long since forgotten all about it…”

“…But isn’t that cowardly?” “That’s—” “That goes without saying.”

"...In the first place... could such a thing be forgotten?... How could..." “Well… Such questions would fall under what the late Dr. Masaki termed the relationship between ‘Memory and Conscience’—I would consider them intriguing research topics…” “So Dr. Saito’s death concluded merely in that sense?” “Indeed.” "It concluded merely in that sense." "While truly anticlimactic in execution, its consequences came to hold profound significance." "In other words, Dr. Saito’s death became the direct catalyst for Dr. Masaki to assume leadership of Kyushu University’s Psychiatry Department and occupy this chair, while also forming the indirect connection binding you and that young lady in Room Six to this classroom." “Indeed… Let us provisionally term it a catalyst here.” “However, whether this catalyst was man-made or divine providence cannot be conclusively determined until after you have regained your own past memories...”

"Ah... th-that... even such things are within my memory..." "That's correct. Within your past memories lie even the vital keys required to unravel such numerous doubts."

I felt as though my entire body were being buried under blocks of icy doubt that came crashing down one after another. Involuntarily closing my eyes, I tried shaking my head from side to side. Yet no memories came welling forth from within. As I did so, even the gruesome *Madman Burning* painting before my eyes, Dr. Saito’s smiling portrait, the pale and solemn Dr. Wakabayashi, the large desk gleaming green, and even the red Daruma ashtray endlessly yawning atop it—each began to feel deeply entwined with my past. At the same time, surrounded by these fateful objects yet unable to recall a single thing, I became acutely aware of the hollowness within my head, growing only more deeply and poignantly sorrowful.

For a moment, I felt utterly lost, my eyes blinking rapidly, but then, as if suddenly remembering something, I asked. “Ha…” “Then, how did Dr. Masaki, who had gone missing, come to be at this university?” “It is due to such circumstances.”

As he spoke, Dr. Wakabayashi dropped the watch he had begun to take out back into his pocket. He gave a feeble cough and continued speaking.

“It was precisely at Dr. Saito’s funeral service that Dr. Masaki appeared out of nowhere and nonchalantly attended.” “It is believed he likely saw the newspaper advertisement… Then President Matsubara apprehended him after the funeral concluded and forced him to assume Dr. Saito’s position then and there.” This was a highly irregular procedure, but since none other than President Matsubara himself was acting as the intermediary for the final wishes of the late Dr. Saito—a man of such elevated character—not a single person found the president’s approach unusual. In fact, he was welcomed with such enthusiastic applause that it bordered on overwhelming. “…If you were to examine the newspapers of that time, they lay bare every detail of these events—but at that moment, Dr. Masaki, clad in a worn-out crested formal kimono and hakama trousers, stood surrounded by the professors’ applause while clutching his head and voicing this complaint:”

“This is troublesome…” “I’d wanted to pursue my research entirely on my own, you see…” “Once you become a university professor, they won’t let you play your favorite wooden fish, and you won’t be able to sing *Chonkare-bushi* anymore.” “In the first place, I can’t exercise my innate wanderlust, you see…”

Dr. Masaki retorted sullenly, but when President Matsubara heard this... “...It’s too late for complaints now—there’s no undoing it.” “After all, it’s your own fault for being summoned here by Dr. Saito’s spirit… So even if they beat that wooden fish as much as they like, you’ll just have to bear it—I must insist you attain Buddhahood at once.”

When he said this, everyone forgot the solemnity of the occasion and doubled over with laughter. "...Dr. Masaki, having then shortly taken up his position at this university, proceeded to actually commence the experiment he had previously sung of in his *Madman's Hell Heretic Ballad*—the so-called 'Liberation Therapy for the Insane'—which once again stirred an extraordinary reaction throughout society." "At the same time, his commencement of that experiment served as the catalyst that forged the fateful relationship now binding Dr. Masaki himself, you, and that young lady in Room Six." "While one might attribute this too to divine will if pressed... nevertheless, being able to welcome so great a man as Dr. Masaki to this university and grant him free rein in his work was undeniably due to the late Dr. Saito's virtuous legacy." "Dr. Masaki, too, must have had this portrait displayed here with such meaning in mind—but..."

I could not help but sigh deeply and look up at Dr. Saito’s portrait. I could not help but ponder the unfathomable thread of fate that bound together a man of such high character as Dr. Saito, a great man like Dr. Masaki, Dr. Wakabayashi before my eyes, that beautiful girl in Room Six, and a fool like myself. A profound silence flowed through the room for a brief moment. However, it was soon shattered by a question I carelessly uttered.

“Ah… October 19th of Taisho 15… The date on that calendar hanging below Dr. Saito’s photograph marks exactly one year to the day since his passing, doesn’t it?” When I said this and turned around… the terror of Dr. Wakabayashi’s transformed expression in that instant… though it lasted but a fleeting moment… his large, pale lips clamped shut as he thrust out his jaw, his pallid eyes wide open to glare at me. Moreover, because it was so abrupt, I too unwittingly adopted the same expression as Dr. Wakabayashi, feeling as though we were glaring at each other—but before long, Dr. Wakabayashi seemed to gradually regain his composure, and this time, with his forehead shining in a manner that appeared utterly satisfied, he nodded repeatedly.

“...How astute of you to notice that.” “Your past memories are awakening with increasing acuity.” “It would seem your recovery has advanced to where only the thinnest membrane now remains...” “In truth, when you posed that question just now, I briefly feared your past memories might erupt all at once... and should that occur, I found myself worrying how best to attend to you...” “What could I possibly withhold?” “That calendar displays a date approximately one month prior to the present.” “Today being November 20th of Taisho 15...”

“Then… why has it remained like that?”

At this moment, Dr. Wakabayashi once again nodded solemnly. With the same reverent attitude he had shown earlier before the young woman in Room Six—an attitude of prayer—he straightened his hunched chest and firmly clasped his hands together.

“That very doubt of yours has become one of the keys to solving the great mystery surrounding your past.” “In other words, once Dr. Masaki had torn the calendar up to that point, he stopped tearing the remaining pages.” “Th-that… why would he…?” “Dr. Masaki died the very next day… Moreover, he took his own life by throwing himself into the same spot behind Hakozaki Aquarium where Dr. Saito had drowned exactly one year prior.”

……A bolt from the blue… or so one might describe it. Struck by an indescribably strange shock, I believe I let out some sort of cry at that moment. And when I had finally calmed down, I think I was moving my mouth as if uttering delirious mutterings. "Dr. Masaki... committed suicide..."

When that voice entered my ears, I doubted them once more. A man as great as Dr. Masaki—a veritable master—committing suicide… Could such a thing really be possible?

But that’s not all. The fact that both individuals who became chief professors of this psychiatry department met unnatural deaths by drowning in the same coastal waters exactly one year apart… Could such a horrifying coincidence truly exist?… I thought in shocked confusion, staring in stunned disbelief at Dr. Wakabayashi’s pale face. At this, Dr. Wakabayashi—unlike ever before—solemnly straightened his posture and stared back at me. Once again, he spoke in a reverent voice as though praying to God.

“...I repeat.” “...Dr. Masaki took his own life.” “Dr. Masaki—who, through twenty long years of meticulous preparation layered upon preparation, had struggled tenaciously to advance his unprecedented grand experiment in liberation therapy—ultimately found his blade shattered and his quiver emptied, so to speak... until circumstances compelled him inexorably toward self-destruction.” “...Yet since mere statements may still leave you uncomprehending, allow me to elucidate concretely: Dr. Masaki’s unparalleled experiment in mental science—a work of singular originality—was designed to reach fruition once you and that young lady in Room Six had recovered your respective past memories, been discharged from this hospital, and commenced a blissful marital union. However, an unforeseen tragic event precipitated an impasse midway through.” “...Moreover, whether that tragic occurrence truly stemmed from Dr. Masaki’s error remained unknown to any living soul.” “...Yet as that day coincided with the first anniversary of Dr. Saito’s passing—as though by celestial design—Dr. Masaki perhaps perceived therein a manifestation of ‘impermanence’... Thus did he assume full responsibility and depart the mortal realm.” “Dr. Masaki entrusted unto me all documents, administrative matters, and related affairs concerning you—the experiment’s central subject—and that young lady in Room Six...”

“Th...then…”

I started to say, then stammered. Feeling my entire body turn pallid from an unnameable agitation, I managed to move my lips. “Then... could it be... that I... cursed Dr. Masaki’s life...?” “No…” “That’s incorrect.” “The exact opposite.”

Dr. Wakabayashi declared in a solemn tone. Still staring fixedly at me, he slowly shook his head from side to side.

“The opposite.” “Dr. Masaki embarked on this research having fully prepared himself to have his own fate cursed by you.” “No… To delve one step further, Dr. Masaki had resolved himself twenty years prior to bring about such an outcome, carrying out his work in meticulous order.” “Dr. Masaki had formulated an unshakable plan to perfectly align the grand experiment in mental science that he himself had discovered with your own fate, and had been proceeding with his research accordingly.”

That explanation struck me as even more terrifying, something that sent shudders through me. Without thinking, I pressed a hand to my tightening chest and spat out the question.

“What... what kind of procedure...” “If you examine the documents here, you will understand.” As he spoke, Dr. Wakabayashi snapped shut the bundle of documents he had been skimming through with one hand while talking and reverently pushed them toward me. I, too, had sensed that it must be an accumulation of some sort of important documents, so I received it with the same reverent manner. And so, I flipped through them tentatively to examine their contents. They consisted of a pamphlet-like item with a red cover placed on top, sandwiched between canvas-backed cardboard along with bound sheets of wool-felt paper bearing pasted newspaper clippings and Western legal-sized ruled paper—all devoid of any writing on the cover. However, as it was quite heavy, I once again snapped the cover shut and placed it back on the desk.

From across, Dr. Wakabayashi pinned his pallid eyes directly onto mine. “...These could be considered Dr. Masaki’s posthumous manuscripts—precious documents indeed.” “To elaborate: Among Dr. Masaki’s research in mental science that I have just described—specifically his most vital works on psychical anatomy, psychical physiology, corresponding pathology, and what might be called the essence of such studies, psychogenetics—these four manuscript types, along with the main text of *Brain Matter Theory* that he had previously taken into his possession, were all burned by him immediately before his suicide. As such, these documents before you now constitute the sole remaining literature through which one might examine the contents of Dr. Masaki’s research.” “Though these materials do not follow their original publication chronology—Dr. Masaki having arranged them precisely in this sequence immediately before taking his own life—reading them in this order allows one to readily grasp how his research unfolded step by step, structured to facilitate clear and engaging comprehension of his mental science theories as they developed.”

"...Namely, the red-covered pamphlet bound at the very beginning is a satirical ballad titled *Madman’s Hell Heretic Ballad*, which Dr. Masaki distributed to gathered crowds on main streets everywhere during his travels across mainland Japan in his spare time. It sang of the fundamental motive that led him to commence his research into mental illness—to rescue patients from the realities of abuse in modern times." "...Next, affixed to woolen-felt mounting paper are newspaper clippings that Dr. Masaki himself preserved—interviews with him published in local newspapers. Among these, the first article titled *‘The Earth’s Surface as a Vast Liberation Asylum for the Insane’* et cetera represented Dr. Masaki’s initial research stance, wherein he explained to reporters—with scathing wit and humor—his motive to save the insane by embarking on psychiatric studies. It demonstrated with utmost clarity and boldness the fundamental principle of psychopathology: *‘Not a single human inhabiting this Earth’s surface is free from mental abnormality.’* ...Furthermore... the subsequent article titled *‘The Brain Is Not the Seat of Thought’* et cetera humorously explained to journalists the contents of Dr. Masaki’s magnum opus *Brain Matter Theory*—a grand thesis that, grounded in these very principles, not only clarified to their absolute depths the true functions of the ‘brain,’ which had until then been deemed impossible to research, but also effortlessly resolved every last one of the strange psychic phenomena related to mental illness and other matters that conventional science had been utterly unable to explain."

“...Next, the document bound in Japanese ruled paper below that—written in brush calligraphy—is the thesis titled *Fetal Dreams*, which could be regarded as the inverse theorem of *Brain Matter Theory*.” “In other words, this document explicitly demonstrates the concept of ‘psychological inheritance’—how the psychological lives of one’s parents, along with various ancestral habits and accumulated mental traits, become transmitted to the fetus itself. It was indeed this very thesis that caused a tremendous sensation during the inaugural graduation thesis evaluations at this university.” “…And one could say that even the distant cause which compelled Dr. Masaki—a man of such prodigious talent—to ultimately take his own life lies embedded within this very thesis… The hasty notes on Western legal-sized ruled paper that follow could be regarded as Dr. Masaki’s final testament—his *Report on the Results of Liberation Therapy Experiments*—left behind to append conclusive findings to those studies… Thus, if you simply examine these documents in their given order, you will effortlessly and systematically come to understand the bold achievements of Dr. Masaki’s lifelong research, through which he staked his very existence to pioneer the grand path of mental science.” “...And simultaneously, the flow and rotation of ancient grand principles of mental science—which have governed your own history from its hidden depths and led you to today’s fate—now emit great radiances one after another, whirling round and round kaleidoscopically before your very eyes……”

I do not remember Dr. Wakabayashi’s explanation beyond this point. Even as I listened to this explanation, I absentmindedly opened the very first red-covered pamphlet. As I skimmed from its title page through the main text, I gradually became drawn in until—before I knew it—I was reading obsessively in a trance... Madman's Hell Heretic Ballad ――Alternate Title: The Dark Age of Madmen―― Austrian Doctor of Science　　　　　　　　　 German Doctor of Philosophy Menkuro Rō Manji Composed by

French Doctor of Literature　　　　　　　　　 ▼Ahh— Aah— Aaaaah. To the esteemed ladies and gentlemen on all sides. Gentlemen and their newlywed wives, ladies and gentlemen, respected elders, esteemed youths. Ladies and gentlemen of the assembled crowd—esteemed attendees— Clack-clack! Since then, naught but neglect. If I call it a riddle, you’ll be shocked. You’d best be shocked—the entire universe! Neglect unending since before we could even begin! Today marks the first time by this roadside. A mad monk has come forth… *Sukaraka*, *chakapoko*. *Chakapoko chakapoko...*

……Step right up, step right up! Step right up and take a look. Listen and come closer. A tale to tell! No money needed. It’s truly free of charge. Step right over here. Don't push. *Chakapoko chakapoko...* ……Step right up, step right up! Come and see, be shocked… *Sucharaka*, *chakapoko*. *Chacharaka*, *chakapoko...*

▼Ahh— Aah—.

A mad monk had come forth. He stood about five feet tall. In age he appeared thirty-five or thirty-six. His head was shaved clean as a monk’s. Sunken eyes; teeth all false. His emaciated ribs formed a washboard. The cloth robe he wore resembled a scarecrow in a field. When one looked at the sandals dragging at his feet— They were mountains of hardened mud. They might have been a tanuki’s mud-caked boat. This beggar-like grotesque monk, Having wandered through lands, Exposed to wind and scorched by sun, Today too beneath the same open sky, Spread his bag by the roadside. Clatter-clack, rattle-tat—he aired his infamy. He recited tales of fate, ancient lore, and origins— If you asked the beaten wooden fish… clatter-clack, rattle-tat. Clatter-clack, rattle-tat...

▼Ah— Ah. Tales of fate—ask the wooden fish. He had no parents, siblings, relatives—of course no wife or mistress either. He was just a lone clattering fellow. No lineage, no background—*sukaraka*, *chakapoko*. A single bag was his entire fortune. Parents were like a tree crotch in a creaking wind. A life left carefree to the blowing wind. A journey through a world wandered far and wide. Beijing, Harbin, Petersburg it was. Red Moscow, square Berlin, drunken Munich, singing Vienna, dancing Paris and dozing London—cross the sea to free America. The women’s market—that New York it was. The gambling—that San Francisco it was. The liquor—that Vladivostok it was. The stagger—all American airs—that America it was. A decade of sheer idiocy—that ten-year endeavor it was. Among all I’d seen and heard— But a single memento—that’s what it was. What a terrifying tale of hell… *Sukaraka*, *pokupoku*. *Chacharaka*, *pokupoku...*

▼Ah— A— Verily, a terrifying tale of hell it was. Moreover, 'tis a factual tale I witnessed plain with these sunken eyes—it was. Today's the premiere, no coin required. Nay more—as listening's fee, I'll give ye this book. The song I sing now—it was. These be letterpress-printed lyrics. Later I'll work some trickery. Ye might think, "Ain't this but a scheme to force sales?" Doubters may lurk among ye— Cast such cares aside. "This be my hobby-work—it was." A propaganda project for humankind's culture—it was. Naught but reference stuff—story fodder—all it was. Come nigh, hark and see... Heretic—Ritual—Ba—lla—d. Mad—ne—ss He—ll——... Clatter-clack, rattle-tat rattle-tat rattle-tat rattle-tat...

One

▼Ah— A—.

Heretic Ritual Ballad: Madman’s Hell. Now then, should you ask where hell lies— The mortal realm itself is right here. The karmic seeds I sowed with this very body Soon bring creaking wheels spinning near. Eyeballs rolling, it rides the fiery chariot To where all circling paths descend. Having crossed realms of Asura, beasts, and hungry ghosts, With a crash they fall—hell’s visage without end. From Needle Mountain to Blood Pond Hell, Great Cold Hell and Scorching Heat, Sword Tree Hell and Stone Grinding Hell, Blazing Heat, Boiling Cauldron, Inverted Hanging complete— Eighty thousand hells exhaust all count, Karmic fruits from mortal deeds amount. Cut apart, smashed, roasted, boiled, Avīci Hell and Screaming Hell—souls coiled, In endless torment where death’s denied. Hear those voices—your fate’s been decided. Skulls split open—you crumple defeated.

A priest’s sermon from on high it was. ……Clatter-clack, rattle-tat rattle-tat rattle-tat rattle-tat rattle-tat……

▼Ah— A—.

A monk’s sermon from on high. But you can’t trust this one. Just rumors ‘bout hells you can’t reach without dyin’. Some live monk collectin’ alms—that’s all it is. A sack o’ lies even Buddha don’t know. The hells I’ve seen— They ain’t like those fancy underworlds. No gongs get struck, no prayers get chanted. No need for train fare to ten trillion realms. There’s hells aplenty right ‘round here... Clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack...

▼Ah— A—. A living hell in this very world it was. That too is the poverty-and-no-leisure hell. The bobbing, bobbing River Bamboo Hell. The Vise Hell of Duty and Compassion. Or the retribution for committed misdeeds. "Halt! You're under arrest! March double-time!" Driven into fixed-term and indefinite hells. It's a vast difference from those hells and such, it was. Not a shred of that logic held water. No breath was exhaled, no glimpse of daylight seen. A hell of unknowable breadth and depth it was. The Yama there was a doctor of medicine. The academics were far from mere Ox-Head and Horse-Face. However, in hell, the infamous tools— They discerned and sniffed out sins of old. Eyes that saw, noses that sniffed, Yama's ledger. Penetrating the human heart through and through. The mirror of pure glass that transparently pierced through— Such a mirror could not even reflect a shadow.

Whether there was sin or none. Without distinguishing between sanity and madness. They herded them in and kicked them down indiscriminately. Just hearing of it made your hair stand on end. Hell existed all around here. In appearance, it was a splendid mental hospital. “If you call it a lie, then come in and see for yourself! The myriad torments were yours to choose. How terrifying this Madhouse Hell… clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack…” ▼Ah— A—. How terrifying this Madhouse Hell it was. Truly terrifying was the mental hospital. “Even if I speak such riddles to all of you, You still might not grasp it yet, but… Things follow an order—pray listen properly! ‘As I listened, it all seemed so utterly plausible—yet I’d no inkling of such things, I tell you.’ Ah—now you see. It makes sense. Once you grasp it—eighty-four thousand— The pores across your flesh prickled with goosebumps. It’s the tale of those nearby hells… clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack…”

▼Ah— A—.

It’s the tale of those nearby hells it was. Now then, as for the origins of such a hell— It begins with the 'I' of inen—fate’s first syllable. Now, if one were to inquire about the very beginning— It is all thanks to civilization and enlightenment. Now then, regarding the world’s civilization and enlightenment— If one were to speak of the origins of ceaseless advancement— The noble gift of scientific knowledge. Among them is the noble work of doctors. Their duty is to cure people’s illnesses… clatter-clack clatter-clack…

▼Ah— A— Their duty lies in curing human ailments. Now among physicians' work— They mend bodily disorders through The methods of surgery and internal medicine, And treat mental afflictions through The practices of mental hospitals— Let us weigh their differences: Gasp in shock—oh! The scraping halts abrupt— The chasm in progress staggers mind... clatter-clack clatter-clack...

▼Ah— A— The difference in progress was utterly astonishing. It must differ—the target itself differs. The human body has visible form. Touch its limbs and torso—you’ll understand. Cut it open—organs lay bare. Percussion, auscultation, X-rays. Pirquet tests, bloodwork— Every diagnostic tool devised. Even unknown maladies— Misprescribed drugs, erroneous exams— Should death come from botched care— Dissect the corpse afterward— The flaw reveals itself instantly. As for diagnostic methods— They progressed daily, monthly. Yet set against this— Even God couldn’t examine the human heart… clatter-clack clatter-clack…

▼Ah— A— The human mind cannot be examined. Even the most renowned physician—still— The human spirit—the madness within— Which pulse would they check? Which tongue make you show? Where in your suffering would they inject? Which anxieties would they resolve? No lenses exist to see nerves’ writhing worms, No fever from longing registers on thermometers— Sham madmen, true madmen— X-rays pierce not this veil. No voice heard, no form seen— Mind’s essence: more elusive than flatulence. How could this ever be scrutinized? As the adage goes: “No cure for fools”— Ancient truths hold fast today. Thus we conclude: mental illness— Beyond diagnosis or remedy, Defying science’s probing grasp.

You realize it’s an incomprehensible thing… scratch-scratch, clatter-clack. Clatter-clack clatter-clack…

▼Ah— A— When one realizes it's an incomprehensible thing, There too lies one thing that defies logic— One notices a bizarre and mysterious fact. What in the world—in the very first place— The human spirit... this madness of the mind... If examination and treatment prove impossible... Then why do psychiatric hospitals and nerve clinics Or madhouses and brain hospitals Throughout the present world everywhere Flourish with rigidly square signboards And elaborately designed entrance façades? They charge exorbitant fees for examinations and treatments, Collecting hospitalization and nursing costs. What work do these strutting psychiatrists perform? Are they swindlers or decoys? No doubt everyone finds this suspicious, But wait—this story follows its proper order: The world's most absurd inside story.

Due to being unable to perform examinations or treatment, it’s a wonderfully lucrative racket for doctors. This here’s the real nonsense chant… scritch-scratch, clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack…

II

Scritch-scratch, clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack……

▼Ah— A— Ahh A—.

Now then—in days of yore upon yore. In the great ancient days of yore. When scientific knowledge had not yet advanced. Even speaking of bodily illnesses— It was no different from mental afflictions. For they comprehended nothing of either. Medical examinations were mere guesswork. House geomancy—cardinal directions—star divination! When they spoke of this or that malady— Prayers! Exorcisms! Sacred waters! Protective charms! Making people receive mystical talismans. They muddled through with this and that— Leaving countless illnesses untreated. Then came medicine's discovery. Swallow it—illness cured completely! Through this they investigated thoroughly until— Human illness lies within the body! The cause lies here—this part gone awry! This reasoned understanding marked medicine's dawn. Now we have anatomy—physiology—pathology.

Medical chemistry, bacteria, pharmaceuticals, and others. Surgery, internal medicine, dermatology, otolaryngology—it was all there. Ophthalmology, orthopedics, gynecology and pediatrics— From corner to corner, they equipped themselves with every tool. Impenetrable instruments and medicines. They treated disorders of the human body. The great radiance of scientific knowledge brightly illuminated each day... scritch-scratch, clatter-clack clatter-clack... ▼Ah— A—. It shone brightly day after day—but. But as for mental illness now— They cured disorders of the human mind. Doctors’ examinations and treatment methods— When one looked at what kind of progress had been made— Long ago, regarding mental patients— They believed it was the transfer of a god’s spirit. They would fear, revere, and worship them. Or they believed it was the work of living spirits or dead souls. They made offerings and treated them with great care. That was one thing, but in some places...

Because they said a demon had possessed this one. In those days, monks and priestesses who served as both doctors and judges would point them out upon finding them— Spears, swords, throwing ropes, bows and arrows. Club-wielding officials smashed every last one of their heads. Limbs and torsos torn to shreds, scattered in pieces. They burned and discarded them or buried them at tree roots. At this very time, the authorities carried out such acts— the same treatment as rabid dog extermination. This was what was done to mental patients. This was the first examination, the first treatment. This was the ABCs of the madman’s hell… scritch-scratch, clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack…

▼Ah— A—. This was the beginning of the Madman’s Hell. Thus with mental illness— Since its cause remained shrouded in mystery— They wielded fabricated superstitions and dark arts. Villains emerged who committed evil deeds. And they were exceedingly cunning ones. Grudges, jealousy, aversion. Or political enemies, business rivals. Driven by hatred and suspicion beyond all reason. After deeming those bastards obstacles— People who had no recollection whatsoever— To priestesses, monks, and officials. They used bribes to have them arrested. They branded them as lunatics without a hearing. They made them face the state’s capital punishment under the law. At best, it meant residence in a jail cell… clatter-clack clatter-clack…

▼Ah— A—.

At best, it’s residence in a jail cell. If we examine world history, high status or peerage or honor, or the succession of property and territories, scandals involving women or succession and inheritance— family disputes, internal squabbles— to rid themselves of troublesome obstacles, examples of such methods being used glimmer here and there. Then when we look at how things are now— I want to say it’s the same as before, but— not only can I not say that—it’s even more cruel now… scritch-scratch, clatter-clack. Scritch-scratch, clatter-clack clatter-clack…

III

……Scritch-scratch, clatter-clack. Clitter-clatter, clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack…

▼Ah... Aah... Aaaaah... Now is this vaunted era of civilized enlightenment, is it not? The omnipotent age of scientific knowledge! Yet amidst such progress—mental illness alone remains mired in primordial darkness. That they cannot conduct proper examinations or treatments— To carelessly utter such claims would be akin to farting out an opening joke! I say those very accusers are the true lunatics! There may exist those who proclaim such things... Oh how I adore these paragons! Reason! Common sense! Scientific erudition— These magnificent souls who never forget their virtues— To these luminaries I make my appeal: Why not conduct a little experiment in your leisure hours? Visit any nearby mental asylum. Or perhaps schools and libraries. Where doctors and scholars from every land— They descend in swarms to conduct their research! Spread open those tomes on madness— Go on—dissect their contents thoroughly!

Indeed, rows upon rows of disease names stood arrayed. Round Western letters and square kanji characters— Hundreds upon thousands jostling shoulder-to-shoulder, to where counting them on one’s fingers proved impossible. So now even mental patients— just like surgical or internal medicine cases— bathed in scientific knowledge’s radiant light. Examinations piercing through to the marrow— rationally devised nursing protocols— they receive every conceivable treatment imaginable. Yet only laymen marvel at this… clatter-clack clatter-clack…

▼Ah— A— It’s only laymen who are impressed. Don’t go flapping your hateful mouth now. Do not be astonished in Westernized Japan. From the farthest reaches of heaven to the deepest depths of earth— The scientists who have thoroughly investigated, Even if they swarm in and research it, The very crux—the most vital part— The self within the hollow of the skull, The brains coiling in spirals— What sort of functions they’re performing— The true state remains utterly incomprehensible. As for those who thought that was a lie— Scholars of all eras and regions— Books that have examined human brains— If you read through them, you’ll see! This is where one hears and sees things, It is the very place where judgments are made. Knowledge, experience, memories of the past— It is indeed a repository for preservation.

What does what do what and this and that— If this were one of those naniwa ballads, it’d be nothing but prelude. Oh, there’ve been mighty debates alright... But not a single verifiable fact’s been grasped—clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack clatter-clack...

▼Ah— A—. Not a single verifiable fact is known. It’s only natural they don’t know—there’s no mystery here. Though this world may stretch vast, When you truly examine human brains, They’re infuriatingly simple and clear— Bizarre, outlandish, absurd beyond compare. If one who’s discerned the brain’s workings— Though this unsought soliloquy may seem brash— ’Tis only me here. ……Should I call this a riddle, ladies and gentlemen, Your brain alone— Baked daily in heaven’s fire— Has warped its nature, I tell you. Whether you’ll mock this as mere puzzle, In truth it may be so, I tell you... Yet this is my life’s work. Scholars and doctors from every land— I’ve completed research that makes them gasp. Twenty billion trillion human society’s—

Swapping brains is my delight. As for that thesis—it'll be published by some university soon enough. It will be published by a certain university. If you take a look at that, you'll understand. As for all other scholars in the world— They don't know how to study the brain. Their every calculation is misguided. At best, they thought it was probably... Truth-posing blunderbusses, I tell you. Even if they can explain one principle, They cannot interpret other facts. If you prop up one side, the other won't stand. In a nine-shaku-by-two-ken room with two storm shutters… creak-clatter, rattle-clack. Rattle-clack rattle-clack……

▼Ah— A—. In a nine-shaku-by-two-ken room with two storm shutters… And what’s more—from morning till night. A zoetrope or a kaleidoscope? Cat’s eyeballs, turkeys. Crying and laughing, spinning round and round, flickering. They employ secret arts of infinite transformations. The true nature of the human mind. What kind of form it could possibly take. How could it have gone mad? Not that I’m Hanshichi the liquor store owner. Where and how it could possibly be. They haven’t understood a single thing. The proof of that stares plain as day before your eyes. In today’s psychiatric literature— Rows upon rows of disease names. The scholars who created such books. Without understanding a single thing about what’s what. They cursorily glance over the patients’ outward appearances. They take gestures and mannerisms as their basis and target.

They even resort to amateurish deception. A lust-crazed one becomes a sex maniac. Kill someone and you're a murderous maniac. A dance maniac must dance. An arson maniac sets fires. What science did they use to determine this? Such transparently obvious labeling. Even non-doctors could assign these names. Angry drunks and weeping drunks. Laughing drunks and clingy drunks. Quarrelsome drunks and ordinary folk. Labeling based on drunken appearances. It's the same method as naming drunks. How strange they can diagnose this way... clatter-clack, rattle-clack rattle-clack rattle-clack.

▼Ah— A—. It’s strange that they can diagnose with this. Well then, they take charge of mental patients. As for Doctors and scholars of medicine— The point where the human mind has gone mad— Or the certain evidence that one hasn’t gone mad. Where and how do they investigate and discern? Those who find this strange are mere amateurs, I tell you. That’s their business—no need to fret… rattle-clack rattle-clack…

▼Ah— A—. That’s their business—no need to fret. All branded mental patients— From distant lands, straight to the doctor’s doorstep. Once they’ve dragged you here— No eye beholds sanity in you. They’re all too far gone. Or seem no different from ordinary folk. Even those perfectly composed. Families and attending physicians— Dutifully finished every official procedure. No doubt they’re madmen. Unlawful confinement? No matter! Every permit stamped and stacked. Brought in broad daylight with honor. Doctors needn’t lift a finger. Families’ tearful testimonies— Patients’ twitches and stares— Books splayed open for cross-checking. Slap on a fitting label—

And with that, the examination concludes—or so they claim. They just brick them up in red walls, that’s all. Among them lurk the misdiagnosed. Scattered here and there, perhaps... But fret not—this too means nothing. Unlike other sicknesses, This one alone—the misdiagnosis can’t be spotted. Once stamped with the ‘Ki’ mark, that’s your end. A brick hell with no escape. “Wrong! Wrong!” they might protest— That very cry becomes proof of their ‘Ki’ brand. A fate unchanged through ages. Label them pyromaniacs— Dissect Yaoya Oshichi, They’d diagnose nymphomania. Deem them kleptomaniac specimens— Hospitalize Ishikawa Goemon, Declare him megalomaniac. No need to fret your ass off over such nonsense. Not a care needed—it’s all quite carefree.

They’re patients who can’t be examined at all. ’Tis a disease where they can’t tell what’s what. Well then, they’re carefree mad doctors… rattle-clack, clickety-clack. Clatter-clack, clickety-clack. Rattle-clack rattle-clack…

▼Ah— A—... Well now, what blithely unconcerned psychiatrists they are! Then how do they conduct treatment? To fret over it only proves you're a boor—an amateur. This too mirrors their examinations. 'Tis pitch-dark groping in blindness, I tell you. That they don't promptly crack your skull— Whether by grace of this advancing age or not— Were we to let the patients' side speak— The inexplicable proof lies plain before your eyes. They care not where—be it Sonjo's streets or elsewhere. Peer inside any madhouse! Iron-barred cells, naturally. As for modern jails and prisons— Tools aplenty unseen in those places: Iron chains and sleeveless shirts, I tell you. Manacles, leg-shackles. Crucifixion beds, I say. Stone boxes with slit windows gaping, All lined up row upon row, I declare.

Even the most heinous criminals— Torture instruments to make your whole body quake… clatter-clank clatter-clank…

▼Ah— A— Torture instruments that make the whole body tremble, I tell you. In stark contrast, the inpatients'— They genuinely cure mental derangement? As for medical instruments and such... Not a single one could be found. For patients who couldn't sleep, they administered anesthetic injections. For those who made a fuss, they gave sedatives. If they refused to eat—nutrient... Injections, enemas—that's all they ever did. They fell short of even the shoddiest physicians and surgeons. If patients recovered, 'twas chalked up as the doctors' triumph. If they died, 'twas brushed off as fate. Ha ha, heh heh—they carried on with Heiza-like composure. Well then, 'tis a terrifying madman's hell... rattle-clack, clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack...

▼Ah— A—. Well then, ’tis a terrifying madman’s hell. But this remains but a prelude. ’Tis the Sanzu River of this lunatic’s inferno. Merely hearing of it sets your very hairs aquiver. What folly—these eight thousand hells! ’Tis naught but fools’ bedlam and lawless nonsense. They persist in every conceivable cruelty. For those souls deemed mad who walk this earth... From this hellish gyre does it all commence… rattle-clack, clickety-clack. Rattle-clack, clickety-clack. Clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack…

Four

▼Rattle-clack, clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack. ▼Ah— A—. Now, pray don’t be so shocked, everyone. ’Tis not a tale of Japan. ’Tis a tale of China and India over there. Psychiatrists around the world— ’Tis built with such merciless hearts. As for the splendid-appearing hospital hells— they’re filled with such foolish departed spirits of patients. Every single one is packed to capacity. That too is only natural—firstly, As for the number of those hellish beds— Even if increased a thousandfold, ten thousandfold from the present. In the human world—there and here— They pop out here and there, leaping forth. They fall short for all the mentally ill. Moreover, once admitted— The period they take to heal being long is one thing— There are also patients who never get out for their entire lives. Whether they will it or not, ’tis packed to capacity.

And so the doctors swaggered—oh how they swaggered! They drove patients to do every manner of thing. Too troublesome to pay your dues? Show but a flicker of reluctance— Out they’d boot you without delay. Home treatment permits in hand. Some emerged whole while others... Left bearing diagnoses anew. There were those who departed in coffins. Replacements came streaming after—after— A ticket gate of jostling crowds… clickety-clack clickety-clack…

▼Ah— A—. It’s a ticket gate where they jostle and push. But that tale’s fishy. Strange, mysterious—utterly baffling! To think they pay coin to such places. What reason could they have to admit folk? For you who find this queer and suspect— You who’ve never had a mad soul among kin— You’re ones untouched by such experience. First, lend your ears at leisure. Yet stranger truths lie ahead. Clickety-clack, rattle-clack—they come leaping forth! ’Tis not my knowing—the wooden fish knows. ……Clickety-clack clickety-clack……

▼Ah— A—. ’Tis not mine to know—the wooden fish knows. There lies an even more astonishing truth. And verily ’tis common everywhere alike. Should they be affiliates of madhouses— Known to all without word spoken. Top Secret—Confidential: A Certified Genuine Article. Were I to tell tales bound by those walls— Though perchance disjointed they may seem— ’Tis the wooden fish’s tale that rings true. They haul their lunatics one and all— To thresholds of red-brick scorn. Even midst those bowing low— Kinfolk—parents, siblings, wives— “I beg thee cure them!” they entreat— Weeping tears and heaving sighs— No few there are who plead thusly— Yet among these flesh-bound ties— Truly steeped in heartfelt passion— Those who tend intent on healing—

In reality, it's only the mothers. That truth alone turned my stomach. When the patient's their son or daughter— When they come with other blood relations— Even fathers and brothers sharing the same blood— They're truly heartless creatures. As for young wives especially— A mere two or three days of pretense. They'd sigh by their side as if— waiting for someone from home to fetch them. They'd pounce with demands like they'd been waiting. That's still not the worst of it! They'd hand the patient to the doctor, and soon after— before the room assignment's settled— Off they'd go to the bathroom, claiming to make a call. Peeking at the mirror in their obi sash. Patting the tips of their noses all the while. Then poof—vanished without a proper farewell. Never to show their faces again...clickety-clack clickety-clack...

▼Ah— A—. “They never show their faces again—that’s the norm. Once it’s decided the illness can’t be cured, showing ’em to doctors is just for show. Coming to abandon ’em—that’s their true aim. This sickness makes life not worth living. ‘I humbly beg your care,’ they say, but when you hear what lies beneath their polite words— if by chance they recovered, what a cursed nuisance! They’d rather see ’em dead if they could. Their black hearts lie plain as day. Here’s where patients meet life or death, and where doctors line their pockets.” “……Now now—don’t go pale like that. ‘Such things…’—spare me your scornful looks. ‘I’ve seen it with these very eyes,’ says I. ‘But mind—this ain’t about Japan. It’s Tang and Tenjiku and Western parts. They’ve neither ears nor eyeballs. ’Tis the tale of wordless wooden fish.”

……Clatter, clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack……

▼Ah— A—. 'Twas the tale of the voiceless wooden fish. 'Twas a telling from Tang and Tenjiku—lands afar. It drew no line 'twixt man nor maid. Once madness claimed a soul, Though calm their visage might appear, They'd lash out without warning— Slashing folk or setting blazes, Spreading vile humors and queer deeds, Laying bare their rot for all to see. Beasts in human skin they were, Unworthy of mortal regard. No cruelty proved too harsh— Though pelted with stone and tile, The guiltless recalled naught. E'en those seemingly restored, None could say when fits might return. Vigilance must ne'er waver, e'en now. And as they've said since days of old: That be blood's curse—oh dreadful fate!

What curse is this? What vengeance? And such! Pointing fingers and glaring eyes—'twas ever society's way. Amidst it all—their own kin. An unforeseen mad soul emerging. Out they spring—lo, a calamity......clickety-clack clickety-clack......

▼Ah— A—.

Out popped someone—what a calamity! And this in high society among the wealthy! If it were a household wanting for nothing? Why—build a private cell at home! To hospitals offering no hope? 'No need,' they say airily! To speak so lightly marks high society—folk who've never tasted hardship! A family with standing? Once madness shows its face—eternal bloodline stain! Their sons and daughters? Marriage prospects ruined! Neighbors below whisper—'Cruel wealth's curse!' 'Retribution for ambition!' Scornful eyes follow! Fingers point behind backs! Grand gates proclaim lineage! There—connections forged! Power abused!

They traced every connection and exerted every effort. They sneaked them into the red bricks. If it happened to be full, they exerted even greater efforts. They made unreasonable requests to the hospital director. After all, this world was a matter of money. All the more so for Madman’s Hell. Even the stern-faced director immediately shifted to a Jizo-like benevolent smile. Instead of welcoming them with merciful hands, they sent other patients off to paradise. Even with money, they still ended up like this……clickety-clack clickety-clack……

▼Ah— A— Even with money，they still ended up like this． Social standing，family pedigree，honor and status— The more one possessed these，the harder home treatment became for the mentally ill． To the red bricks they sneaked them， unable to rest until sealing them away． Yet middle-class society faced fixed monthly salaries， that slender lifeline of income． Among those they relied on—the household head and family— should madness strike one， renters faced eviction’s devouring jaws． A private cell lay beyond imagining． When patients demanded greater care， savings and pensions dissolved like smoke． Moreover，the caregiver— if husband，work attendance crumbled； if wife，labor grew impossible； or children attending school—

That was the seed of their 'mark of disgrace,' and such— They found themselves surrounded and ridiculed on all sides. An inexpressible heartache and bitterness— They all came crashing down at once. If this last remaining lifeline— To the dear Director of the Red Bricks— When they came up with unworkable plans— Wherever they went, it was all full……clickety-clack clickety-clack……

▼Ah— A—. Wherever they went, every place was packed. And when things hit rock bottom, With that hand-to-mouth daily grind— The wife taking piecework, the daughter at the factory— A family like that? The misery defied description. No nursing care to speak of, let alone medicine. Before you knew it, the whole household would gather, Jaws hung from the ceiling in despair. "If only they'd go mad and die," you'd curse, Wishing things were better somehow. But Lord Madman himself? Far from dying—stuffing his face with heaping meals, That hopeless mug never looking to recover……clickety-clack clickety-clack……

▼Ah— A— A face with no hope of recovery. Such was the state of the human world— Were they wheat smut or rapeseed blight? Like the rot afflicting flowers and vegetables, Without reason or rationale, They sprouted forth one after another: Countless psychiatric patients Admitted free of charge into hospitals In this vast world teeming with universities— And how many hundreds of beds could they hold? Yet this was no act of charity But research material for professors and students— Living specimens for lecture demonstrations. They cherry-picked whatever suited their needs And turned away the rest at their gates. As for private institutions? All business through and through— Money-driven and authority-saturated, Packed to bursting with esteemed patients…clickety-clack, clickety-clack……

▼Ah— A—. It’s packed to bursting with high-society patients. Thus overwhelmed by this tide, Countless madmen— How and where could they dispose of them? Now when they curiously examined it— Well now—this tale comes secondhand. They could neither hear nor see. A mute cripple of a wooden fish. The stories they’d witnessed and heard— An empty belly knows no bias. They hammered out a madman’s liturgy. The frayed incantations of hell’s pilgrims. With a thud—down another circle they fell. ……Step right up, gather close—here’s a story worth your ears. No coin required. Hear it and reel…skitter-skitter, clickety-clack clickety-clack. Chatter-clatter, clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack……

Five

▼Skitter-skitter, clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack. Aa—Ah—Aaah—Ah—. E— E—. Now then, ladies and gentlemen, such being the case. When a mad patient appeared, unlike other illnesses and matters, the sane family members left behind endured unbearable torment. They really could not keep them at home like this. Even if they deliberated on what must be done, they could find no solution whatsoever. In the midst of all this, they contrived a desperate plan. Money ran out; work became impossible. Soon the family’s desiccation lay before their eyes. Alas, such sorrow! Such grief! Such bitterness!…Clickety-clack clickety-clack……

▼Ah— A—. Alas, such anguish! Such grief! Such torment! Though I myself care not a whit—it's my aged parents first of all... Even my beloved child's future. For one who finds no worth in living. Is abandoning them to institutional care truly proper? Before becoming burdens to others. To hang themselves by the neck along with the patient. Is gathering the whole household to die together truly righteous? What karma brings such cruel trials—they weep and rail, yet the crux remains. The very patient stares vacantly, Restlessly glancing about...clickety-clack clickety-clack......

▼Ah— A—. They were just restlessly looking around. Even if the original form remained. The original mind was a hollowed-out husk. Merely retaining human form. They were harder to dispose of than dogs or cats. It was pitiful—utterly and completely so. If only they could exchange this reality for another, At the bitter end of their anguished struggles. Driven to desperation, they committed a grave crime…skitter-skitter, clickety-clack. Clickety-clack clickety-clack…….

▼Ah— A—. They committed a grave crime, driven to desperation. They pretended to relocate to some distant province, headed for a hospital in an unknown place, made a show of going to admit them where others could see, to the edge of wild mountains from which they would never return. They abandoned the patient with tears of sorrow. Yet this one differed from an abandoned child— no merciful soul existed to gather and nurture them. Far from finding refuge—wherever they went— they were beaten and driven out. Where they starved, froze, and collapsed, tree roots, grass roots—they might fertilize them. Knowing this full well, they abandoned even these devils. They peered about restlessly— the pitiful patients' lingering forms— in the shade of distant objects and trees, countless clasped hands...clickety-clack clickety-clack......

▼Ah— A— There were countless clasped hands. The old tales dated back to the Engi era of old— Like Semi-maru and Lady Sakagami— By what karma had both come together? The blind man and madwoman's unseemly forms indeed. They had been abandoned at their father's august gate, Leaving the flower capital behind to journey far— To unforeseen sorrows at Ōsaka Mountain's... This tale was too precious to cut short. Such were the heartrending customs of this fleeting world. The disposal of desperate secrets— Past or present, east or west—it mattered not where. Whether one had money or not—high or low social status— They didn't consider right and wrong or reason...clickety-clack clickety-clack......

▼Ah— A— They cast aside all notions of right and reason... Thus driven to wilderness edges they went— Among these lost souls wandering in misery, Those retaining shreds of sanity Would scavenge through others' refuse heaps, Surviving on scraps they managed to beg— Yet even should their wits return in time, The world's cruel bitterness would seep Into their bones past bearing— Or else ashamed of their own wretched forms, Thinking to spare what family remained, They'd renounce both kin and society entire— Their tears now shaping a beggar's existence— Three days of this and the habit stuck fast— Sinking into that carefree realm they'd heard tell of— Such became your local famed mendicants— Or else joined mountain vagrants and outcasts— At temple gates... In shrine groves' shade... By bridge-side kamaboko stalls...

Delousing to pass the time— If you gathered them one by one, It would amount to a considerable number. And such wretched forms— All this hellish suffering— The state and society feigning ignorance— They stop just short of telling them “Why don’t you die?”— Countless numbers vanishing under coldhearted treatment— One or two among thousands...clickety-clack clickety-clack... ▼Ah— A— One or two among thousands. Well now, ladies and gentlemen—what say you? “If this were an ordinary illness,” “They’d be cared for better than the healthy!” “Doctors! Medicine! Nurses!” “Soft beds and fine food—” “They’d receive care beyond measure!” “Not just humans—even dogs and beasts,” “Even little birds and goldfish sometimes,” “Are tended with utmost devotion.”

"In contrast, mental patients—" Due to not knowing the true nature of their illness, either Red Bricks or the edge of wilderness. A torment of hell they could not escape either…clickety-clack clickety-clack……

▼Ah— A—. A hellish torment they cannot escape, ’tis. “However, ladies and gentlemen, do lend me your ears. “Up till now, I’ve been beating this wooden fish—clickety-clack— “The tale of hell I’ve hammered out.” The Hospital Hell and Wilderness Hell— Genuine through and through, gold-leaf certified— ’Tis where mental patients descend. Your ordinary Madman’s Hell, ’tis. “Now then—with renewed vigor— “They raise impertinent voices against their elders. “I shall expound this hellish tale. “To which I’ve added another twist— “A terrifying, monstrous tale of hell! “They who know neither sin nor retribution, “Ordinary men and women of sound mind, “While retaining full faculty of reason, “Suddenly find their limbs constrained. “Silenced unto forced demise— “Dragged in by brute force unreasonable, “They’re beaten down into Madman’s Hell, ’tis.”

Moreover, upon closer scrutiny. In places like Cathay, Ind, and Western lands. There stood grand edifices lined in rows. Clickety-clack clickety-clack...

▼Ah— A—. They were truly splendid grand structures. Even upon their polished golden signboards. In the large newspaper advertisements as well—So-and-so Hospital, So-and-so Treatment— Nothing but square, rigid pompous writing. They didn’t specifically write ‘hell,’ but... The police, newspapers, detective agencies and such— While knowing full well the true substance— A strange business of feigning ignorance. To within those government-sanctioned doors. Once you carelessly set one foot inside, ’twas the end. Though they wept and screamed and raved and thrashed— A world of darkness from which they could never escape, ’twas. Unaware that such a place existed. The world of twentieth-century culture, ’twas. The omnipotent era of scientific knowledge, ’twas. The world of law, morality and etiquette—’twas. They strutted about with arrogant swagger. Tomorrow, oneself might fall therein. The deepest pit of Madman’s Hell, ’twas……Clatter-clang, clickety-clack clickety-clack……

VI ▼Clickety-clack clickety-clack. Clickety-clackety-clickety-clack. ▼Ah— A—. I don’t think ’tis found in Japan though… To kill a person—’tis daggers or pistols, Anesthetics, poisons, silk cords, handkerchiefs— Countless such tools exist. But among civilized nations, In that so-called Number One True Country, In Tamageta City its capital, The new methods I witnessed— Dashing, noble, modern tools— Conducted openly in broad daylight, With police and doctors standing witness, Leaving neither bloodstains nor fingerprints. No matter what prosecutors or detectives, Should they investigate with suspicion— A splendid method where no finger can be pointed—’tis. Though it costs a pretty penny.

However, in return, the profits are substantial. In this world, money is the enemy, ’tis……Clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack……

▼Ah— A—.

"In this world, money is the enemy, ’tis. First comes inheritance disputes, ’tis. Politics, diplomacy, military secrets— Some grand moneymaking scheme. That single-minded resolve born from deeming yon bastard a hindrance. The mark walks alone— To his mistress’s den or gambling den, Or some secret meeting place. They’d slip into his hideaway, Pinpoint nearby routes, Bring along that shrivel-souled psychiatrist They’d kept on retainer. ‘Officer Sonjo,’ they’d implore, ‘He’s my dear friend truly, But shows queer humors— Wanders lonely places, Never returns home. This vagrant madness needs doctoring.’ Yet when approached, ‘I’m perfectly sound!’ he’d cry, Swinging his blade in fury."

“A drastic measure we couldn’t avoid.” They knew he always passed through this area. They lay in wait to apprehend him. “There, a few of your associates—” “Might we enlist your assistance?” With such words, they slipped them some money. The doctor’s recommendation changed hands in an instant. They carried out their scheme as planned. Drop it with a thud, and it comes back to haunt you. The target plunges into a bottomless pit— A Madman’s Hell where none escape alive… Clang-clang, clickety-clack clickety-clack……

▼Ah— A—.

A Madman’s Hell from which none could escape, ’twas— All over some trifling family squabble— When their target remained tender in years— Should they come bearing son or daughter— More artful methods lay at hand— Particularly for those drunk on modern thought— The neurotic sort— Why—’twould spare them no end of trouble— They’d handle them with ironic flair— Or entangle them in circumstance— Straightaway—a neurasthenia case ’twould become— Cheeks draining pale—eyes glittering fierce— Speech and bearing warping strange— To doctors who’d seized upon this truth— Once examined—the prey was theirs— Convalescence but a hollow pretense— Flower buds left forever sealed— Ah—wretched souls plunging to Avīci’s depths……Clickety-clack clickety-clack……

▼Ah— A—. Ah, pitiful they who descend into Avīci Hell, ’tis. They specialized in such patients. They managed to carry on even as a proper nation. Dr.Mattaku, notorious for his clamor, ’twas. Even he had been an ordinary doctor at first. Those he handled were patients of this sort. The fees he received were splendidly large. Thus they gradually specialized in that field. Now they thrived with packed houses and booming trade. In the utterly flabbergasted city— They had established a model hospital. Within were arrayed modern culture’s trappings. State-of-the-art torture instruments. An airtight murderous apparatus ’twas. Should one glimpse within, midsummer’s swelter would turn— To a freezing hell of sub-zero torment ’twas. Yet without, the facade stood pristine. A gleaming entrance portico. Cars beyond count lining the approach.

Moreover, their strength lay in holding the secrets of wealthy and prominent families. They could extort money at will through blackmail. If that method failed... They'd target the very person—the secret's true nature itself. Those patients they'd forcibly rendered sane—they'd declare it a misdiagnosis, I tell you! They'd discharge them fully recovered immediately, I say! Or they'd pose as the patient's ally—threatening to expose your secrets to the world! After wringing them dry with this and that... When their extortion victims faced bankruptcy... If they feared their own misdeeds being exposed... To those secret hospitalized patients—one injection, a dollop of liquid medicine! Even if autopsied later, they had to use such drugs—whether the patient had raged enough to warrant it or not! Current medical science couldn't tell! That was precisely Dr. Mattaku's cunning trick!

It’s the secret behind the psychiatrist’s magic tricks… Skritch-scratch, clickety-clack. Clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack……

▼Ah— A— It was the secret behind the psychiatrists’ magic tricks. And yet countless more mysteries remained. This was indeed the very heart of Madman’s Hell. Even in the proper nation’s flabbergasted city— Dr. Mattaku audaciously conducted such business while his fellow diligent physicians not only refrained from pointing fingers... he faced neither complaints nor criticism. The government, police, even newspaper reporters— they all kept silent and watched… scritch-scratch, clickety-clack. Clickety-clack clickety-clack……

▼Ah— A—. They just kept quiet and watched. The proper nation’s continuing mysteries— It was the great treasure chest of secret funds. Enormous sums of money leaked out through there, Into Dr. Mattaku’s pocket, Stealthily, without making a sound. Not only that—on Dr. Mattaku’s Broad shoulders and large chest Hung rows upon rows of metals and medals. Those too were great meritorious services to the nation From the civil and military officials who presented them— Extraordinary things you could hardly ever receive, I tell you. Germany, France, England, Russia. Japan apparently didn’t make the cut. And speaking of that—what sort of great service Would Dr. Mattaku have had to perform Facing such world powers, To receive such medals, I ask you? This left everyone utterly dumbfounded… Scritch-scratch, clickety-clack.

Clickety-clack clickety-clack……

VII

▼Scritch-scratch, clickety-clack. Clickety-clack clickety-clack. Ah— A—. "Well now, ladies and gentlemen, you must be thoroughly bored. I imagine you must be thinking so, but if I were to stop here... It’d be like crafting a Buddha without enshrining its soul." In this tattered, crumbling prologue of grand unveiling... The arrayed multitude of mysteries. They were neither seen nor heard. The true nature of scientific culture’s hell. To the very rock-bottom depths of the dondokodon. Smashing through, laying bare, spreading wide. "This is truly a flabbergasting tale, I tell you. Absolutely dreadful! So that’s how it is." Until the assembled onlookers reached an understanding. "There we go—I humbly inquire after your esteemed dispositions. A hellish disarray never to be heard of again. A tale of the most mysterious wooden fish in all the world… Scritch-scratch, clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack…"

▼Ah— A— A hellish disarray never to be heard of again. It was the deaf-mute wooden fish's idiotic sutra-chanting, he declared. Well then—scritch-scratch, clickety-clack. Now then, as for the Hontou People's Nation— On the surface, it was a world power. If it was number one in the world, then it was the nation's great boast. It had been decided as the home of freedom and justice. A people's rights-based ideal nation, they called it. It was called such but differed from Japan. Anyone could become the head of state. Money-based. Power-based. Because there was neither the character for loyalty nor the word itself. From start to finish, money did all the talking. Justice, law—they could be bought with money. Conscience, chastity—those went without saying. Freedom and civil rights—pursued without regard for means. The vulture-like tenacity of those who seized and never let go. The top-tier billionaires— The nation's interests were their own interests. Entirely unshakable calculations.

Because they held the actual political power. No matter how many times the government changed, The prestige of billionaires remained unaltered. From ministers and diet members at the top Down to police officers and soldiers at the bottom— They monopolized the nation’s prosperity entirely. The top-tier billionaires’... They were but clerks and underlings of moneymaking, I tell you. Wearing the mask of law and justice, They trampled down one after another— The freedom, morality, social obligations and human compassion Of weak yet righteous people. Thus did people come to abhor from their very hearts The cruel splendor of such wealthy individuals. The scholars and pastors who championed justice, Under freedom of speech, Began delivering speeches attacking the tycoons, Or wrote condemnations in books. "Hear, hear!" everyone praised, And the support of the lower classes gathered.

Public opinion to overthrow the capitalists surged... Scritch-scratch, clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack...

▼Ah— A—.

Public opinion to overthrow the tycoons swelled. Thus did the tycoons become demons of calamity. They raised such arguments and public opinion, Flung magazines and newspapers onto desks, "What do you intend to do about this?" they demanded, Cigars in hand as they denounced the government. At this, the government found itself greatly troubled— And troubled they should be, those government lackeys. For if they displeased their tycoon masters, Their positions would be in peril, Their election funds cut off. Yet individual freedom remained freedom— Not a single law did they violate. These paragons of logical integrity, These scholars and pastors championing justice— They couldn't very well be hounded to death. Were they thrown in prison, Fierce public opposition would erupt. Having reached their wits' end, They descended through layers of Madman's Hell.

Even among such scholars and pastors, they singled out only the ringleaders as targets. When it suited their methods, they deployed detectives to lie in wait without their target's knowledge. Finding him alone in some desolate place, they crept up from behind as he walked. In the blink of an eye, they dragged him down. Restraining him as one would a mental patient, they clamped heavy manacles on his wrists and ankles. They pressed an anesthetic-drenched handkerchief to his face. Dr. Mattaku—whom they'd kept waiting in the shadows—they hurled him into the hospital automobile, aiming for his eyes. The rest goes without saying... Clickety-clack clickety-clack...

▼Ah— A— The rest goes without saying, you know Civilized nations have caught on to this, I tell you They make no distinction between state and individual Those cornered by their wicked schemes They declared, "There's no more convenient method than this!" They all came rushing with their secret requests The patients admitted were politicians, scholars Military spies, great inventors Tycoons, heirs and successors of eminent families Or the likes of famous actors and stars The ambitions of others and their ill-gotten gains Or secret planned projects Did they even have the skill to interfere? They were in elite positions, but it's karma No preliminary hearing, public trial, or sentencing Life sentences and fixed-term penal servitude, of course A death penalty more convenient than the electric chair It's all a matter of whatever orders they pleased Truly, this is the work of hell... Clickety-clack clickety-clack...

▼Ah— A—. Truly, this is hell's handiwork. Among those patients descending into that place, of course there were lunatics and madmen too. They existed as mere formalities. But mingled among them were exceptional individuals - heroes, stalwarts, geniuses and such. Clad in white garments like startled deer, the ox-headed and horse-headed demons of Madman's Hell guided them by hand and foot from behind, while those above amassed mountains of gold and medals. Dr. Mattaku smirked as he saw them off... Clickety-clack, clickety-clack. Clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack......

Eight

▼Clickety-clack, clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack. ▼Ah— A—. Why, ladies and gentlemen! Esteemed members of this vast assembly. This is my souvenir from abroad. It clings to the shadow of modern culture. 'Tis a tale of hell formed from this world. Birds chirped and leaves grew thick. Flowers, autumn leaves, and the Pure Land... Wandering mental patients within. Cast adrift by those they relied on. They cannot even cry over their sins or punishments. The pitiful figures of madman beggars. In this village here, in that town there. Night after night, day after day, they are relentlessly pursued. They are pelted with stones and roof tiles. They are beaten by rain and exposed to wind. They vanish into snow and ice. They created such a hell in this world. Even the round, bright Heavenly Sun-sama.

Heavenly Sun-sama swiftly turned His face away. Did I say I didn’t know, or didn’t I?

Sparklingly, sparklingly he laughs with grandeur… Clickety-clack clickety-clack…

▼Ah— A—.

Sparklingly, sparklingly he laughed with grandeur… That would still have been a carefree hell. Round-the-clock electric lights and gas lamps of materialistic scientific culture only shone brighter the more they blazed. What darkened was spiritual culture. Money and women, rights and duties - an unscrupulous contest of wicked wits, an unreasonable struggle for survival. Trains, cars, airplanes - they crisscrossed and swarmed unrestrainedly in all directions. Human fate lay just an inch ahead where a secret door lurked in the dark. The old and young, men and women brought here made no distinction between madness and sincerity. Fools and sages all stood equal in a single line. They kicked it in with a thud and slammed it shut, permitting not a single word of complaint. A destination where they sank away without sound or scent.

The light of this mortal world’s reason and human compassion. Tis a world of abyssal darkness where not even shadows are cast. Tis a realm of reinforced concrete bricks and cement construction. Tis the hell of scientific knowledge in this world. The overlapping Madman's Hells within. The one above is Kindness Hell. Next comes Contempt and Sneering Hell. Below lies Abuse and Assassination Hell. The bottom is an unfathomable Hell... clickety-clack clickety-clack...

▼Ah— A—. The rest were unfathomable hells of... Next in line came one truly terrifying hell. This was the Hell of Total Comprehension. Damn that bastard! To think they'd throw me—me in my right mind—into such a place! To think they'd thrown me into such a place! I gnashed my teeth, writhed in agony, stomped the ground in frustration— The more I stomped, the more it became Kindness Hell. If I didn't stop even then, it'd turn to Abuse Hell. And then would come Bone-White Regret Hell. I fell into an abyss where even shapeshifting offered no escape... Clickety-clack clickety-clack...

▼Ah— A—. They fell into an abyss where even shapeshifting offered no escape. Such perilous doors to hell... If such hellgates truly existed everywhere, what would become of us all? The esteemed onlookers were naturally included. Government authorities, scholars of the realm— none in the intellectual class were spared. Those with blood and tears in their veins could not pretend ignorance and abandon them. In an old senryū verse: a parlor prison, where even medicine-taking required constant vigilance. (A note explained: "In parlor prisons, no negligence when taking medicine"—Yanagidaru—) This from Edo's bygone days. How much more so in modern culture— how much more so amidst scientific progress— when confronting the human brain's essence, the true nature of the mind! Because they could make neither heads nor tails of it, the methods of psychiatric research remained completely deadlocked—unchanged from ancient times. Counterfeit madmen and true madmen.

Despite being unable to clearly distinguish between them, they aped the forms of other medical fields. Going on about treatments and diagnoses... they erected rigidly square hospitals. Medical instruments, specimens, medicines, and books— when they lined these up like trophies and strutted about, the creation of such hells became inevitable. To prevent this was now our most urgent task. These hospitals—wherever they might be found— smashing them to rubble became the paramount urgency... Skritch-scratch, clickety-clack, skritch-scratch, clickety-clack. Clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack clickety-clack...

Nine ▼Clatter-clack, clickety-clack. Clatter-clack, clickety-clack... Indeed, such sham hospitals. To prevent Madman's Hells from being created. Should you ask whether there exists a method to prevent it— There remains but a single means. And it constitutes no small undertaking. To an island blessed with fair climate and scenery, Remote yet accessible by convenient routes, A full ten million yen shall be devoted. I myself—the very speaker—shall devise innovations To erect an immense mental hospital, Establish there a research laboratory, And admit patients without charge, That such Hells might never form. This liberation therapy I shall implement— Another original contrivance of mine— Being naught but proper mental science's True treatment for madness. No medicines employed, no surgeries performed.

Iron chains, stone boxes, iron boxes. Sleeveless restraint shirts and such—we use none of them. All psychiatric patients— We drive them out to open spaces. We administer the most natural and proper treatment. That is what liberation therapy aims to do. It is, so to speak, a pasture for the mentally ill. 'Tis the Pure Land for madman patients. A strange, bizarre, peculiar, and unparalleled— The world’s first mental hospital. 'Tis freely open to anyone’s observation. What splendid spectacle it will become? I won’t know unless the lid is opened. Every single thing is a brand-new invention. Clickety-clack, clatter-clack. Clickety-clack, clatter-clack clatter-clack...

▼Ah—ah! Every single thing is a brand-new invention! I shall announce them all in due time. Not one scholar in the world knows the fundamental principle behind madness! And it's devilishly simple and clear! This splendidly outrageous and delightful theory I shall put to practical trial! Preventive diagnosis proves utterly impossible! No medicines exist, no surgeries can be performed! Uncover madness' true nature— should diagnosis and treatment become feasible, why, 'twould earn acclaim beyond measure! Among all races in this world, the Japanese race stands supreme! A nation upholding justice and humanity! The vanguard of mental science! This I shall make them declare... Clatter-clack clatter-clack...

▼Ah—ah! My wish is to have them say it. But ten million yen— Money’s no trifling matter. What I inherited from my parents— Rice fields and paddies, savings and bonds— Even pawning old loincloths for cash— Barely amounts to half the sum. For the remainder, I must beg government aid— And one more thing from you all— Your pure and noble benevolence— I resolve to stake everything on your support— Five rin or one sen—even a straw’s worth— A begging monk who spurns no offering— I shall beat my head… clatter-clack clatter-clack…

▼Ah—ah! I shall beat my head.

But such a begging monk— He indeed appeared to be half of the "Ki" character. His eyes and demeanor were somehow peculiar. In a state no different from outcasts and beggars, he threw down a bag by the roadside. Raising a hoarse voice, he clattered the wooden fish—clatter-clack— exposing his public disgrace in broad daylight. Moreover, his spiel defied all common sense: "It’s the ten million yen of world culture! Not heard by the ear, not even shown to the eye— to cure the madness of people’s hearts! Unparalleled research in all history!" Listing outlandish things beyond all reason— a swindling monk gathering donations. "Do you think I’d fall for such an old trick? He went dawdling about where he shouldn’t have!" "If you command me to hurry up—" "This is perfectly and absolutely reasonable." "It’s the height of reasonableness—clatter-clack, clatter-clack!" "I shall beat my head in apology… clatter-clack clatter-clack…"

▼Ah—ah! I shall beat my head in apology. In the first place—what in the world— Such a clattering, clacking head. Beating the wooden fish beyond my station. It has no one to rely on nor does it become money. I expose unnecessary humiliation to broad daylight. The origin lies in Madman's Hell. Madman's Hell spreads across the underbelly of civilized society. A bottomless hell of absurdity and barbarism. Neither brush nor words nor wooden fish can suffice. The cruelty, the poignancy, the sadness and bitterness of it all. Thanks to having seen to the very bottom. My head’s a bit off. I cannot abandon this as it is. My conviction became the seed of karma. I must find methods and means to save this. After all that deliberation over this and that— Take in mental patients free of charge. Building a huge hospital comes first.

To build that hospital required all your—your collective voice’s power! Even one rin or sen mustn’t be wasted—this beggar’s guise you see before you serves as apology for offending refined eyes! Now regarding this Madman’s Hell ballad... These printed volumes shall be distributed freely—no donations needed! Take them home! Read them well! Truth bleeds through these pages! For those who considered contributing... My life’s work—the Lunatic Salvation Project’s core—demands deeper scrutiny! Or perhaps you seek curios from global wanderings? Unorthodox mad tales? Family curses... bloodline flaws... Living phantoms... vengeful wraiths...

They drove people’s hearts to madness and bewilderment. A terrifying tale of karmic causality. "Shall we hear it, or perhaps..." "In some place where multitudes gather," "if we were to stage such a story..." "it might serve as a most novel diversion." "If it would please you, though it may trouble your hands," "here lies an inserted postcard." "Pray write your name and address here," "and at this page’s end," "inscribe it upon the affixed label." "Then cast it postward with a toss, I humbly beg." "What I entreat lies within this world—" "the fact that such truths exist." "To the three houses across and both neighbors—oh!" "As fodder for gossip among all and sundry," "kindly pass this tale along." "Then the Madman’s Hell of which I speak—" "the secret underbelly of human culture—" "will spread through society whether they will it or no."

Mental hospitals that do bad things. Smash through every last Madman’s Hell. Public opinion swelled to “Crush them!”… Clang-clang-clang-clang…

▼And so the government could not remain silent. A critical issue that could not be abandoned. Deeming it an urgent social work initiative, all of the property I would contribute— with over five million yen as its foundation— would take in mental patients free of charge. A national mental hospital was to be established. Of mental patients everywhere, they began alleviating overabundance... Clang-clang-clang-clang...

▼Forgotten by people and forgotten by the world. They ended their lives struggling in madness. The poor mental patients were saved... Clang-clang-clang-clang...

▼Not only that—at that mental hospital. The madness they began researching. The treatment methods spread throughout society. The Madman's Hells across the world... Every last one of them overturned. Every single mental patient's. If the tormenting to death ceased. This was not my true objective at all... Pok-pok chaka-chaka...

▼Ah——ah! "This is by no means my ultimate objective. So indeed, your work is... It stands as the very pinnacle of perfect reason. Admirable! Impressive! A splendid resolution!" "I'm right here with you—no need to fret. Hmmph! Dig in and make 'em buckle down! Rip apart the Madman's Hell—down to the last clang! Crush them! Hoora—y hooray!" Should you deign to praise this endeavor, My joy would soar beyond the very rafters... Clang-clang clatter-clatter clang-clang clatter...

<十>

▼Clatter-clatter, clang-clang. Clatter-clatter, clang-clang. Aaaah——!

Now then, dear listeners—I must beg your pardon. Urgent matters press—I detain your wandering feet. With this strange visage and curious phrases, I offer deepest regrets for this interruption. Yet when I ponder deeply— The time flowing through three thousand worlds: Tens of thousands, hundreds of millions, trillions of years—within unknowable eternity, Even should one live to fifty, seventy, a hundred, A lifetime passes in the blink of an eye. Never grasping what truly matters, Meeting and parting, being born and dying away, Amidst countless souls. Today here at this roadside, That our paths crossed must be fate’s design. I humbly crave your clemency. Though we now must bid farewell, The echoes linger—skalakachaka-poko! Should you later hear whispers in the world... In magazines, newspapers, novels and such, Should you peruse tales of madness...

Or should you encounter true mental patients— If you were to behold them clinging to the roadside— I implore you to remember: The moon’s glow and sun’s radiance, The starlight too blotted out whole— That bedazzling modern culture! Or compassion’s luminous mercy— Even justice’s searchlight beams— A world left unlit as ages past— In a Madman’s Hell surpassing hell itself— A vanishing point where sound and scent dissolve— An infinite expanse of darkness— Below drifts a bluish-tinged sea of blood— Above flicker wandering phosphor flames— They perish sinless and unavenged— The bitter regrets of madhouse inmates— Countless grudges heard yet unheard— The listening heart becomes lament’s refrain— A fool’s dharani replacing Buddhist prayer— Kept time by this tuneless wooden fish—

A brief inquiry into your esteemed disposition. Ge-dou——saa——ee——moo——nnn. Madman’s Hell—ii—Hell—u. ——Hey. My deepest gratitude for your patience——

◆Please send postcards to the address below.

Kyushu Imperial University Faculty of Medicine Professor of Psychiatry Dr. Saito Juhachi, c/o his private room Addressed to Menkuro Rō Manji

┌───┐ │　　　│ └───┘

The Earth's surface is The Grand Liberation Therapy Field for the Insane Kyushu Imperial University

Statement by Dr. Masaki Keishi

Psychiatry Department

Since its commencement in early March at the rear of Kyushu Imperial University’s Psychiatry Department Main Building, the “Madman Liberation Therapy Field”—steadily progressing alongside the construction of its affiliated hospital—had until recently maintained strict confidentiality regarding its operations; however, it was now revealed that this facility had been established through the personal funds of Dr. Masaki, the department’s newly appointed professor. Regarding this matter, Dr. Masaki spoke as follows to visiting reporters in his professor’s office.

“The public seems to be making a fuss these days, claiming that the ‘liberation therapy’ I initiated at Kyushu University is my original creation or some novel and innovative treatment—but to speak truthfully, it is neither my invention nor any new form of therapy.” “To put it plainly, this Earth’s surface has been a grand liberation therapy field for the insane since time immemorial—long before histories or legends took form—where the sun serves as its director, the air as its nurse, and the soil as its provisioner.”

“……Having said that, I am by no means engaging in eccentric rhetoric,” he declared. “The reason I can assert such facts with due cause is this—let there be no concealment—it is no exaggeration to say that my ‘mental illness research’ takes its first step from the foundational fact that ‘the Earth’s surface has become a grand liberation therapy field for the insane.’” “The reason for this,” he continued, “is that humans born upon this earth collectively decide—regardless of social status, age, or gender—to immediately label as ‘cripples’ those they discover to lack control over even a single finger, or to possess some deficiency or excess, thereafter despising them, pitying them, or granting them special treatment.” “Similarly,” he pressed on, “when they find humans whose mental faculties are not under their own control—or whose mental functioning is deficient or excessive in some aspect—they appear to collectively decide to promptly brand them as psychiatric patients—that is to say madmen—and subject them to discriminatory treatment.” “They seem to consider it permissible,” his voice sharpened, “to heap contempt and abuse upon psychiatric patients as if they were lower than beasts and insects... But... If that is so—” here he leaned forward—“then are the minds of these so-called ordinary people—who scorn and sneer at those psychiatric patients—truly equipped with everything in perfect satisfaction?” “Do the brains of all people,” he concluded, sweeping a hand through the air, “truly move freely and without constraint, in perfect accordance with the commands of their own will, down to every last corner?”

“I dare declare! Through academia’s fair and rigorous lens—one cannot possibly think otherwise! No different than those with twisted limbs or missing features—merely invisible to fleshly eyes! In truth—nay!—I stake my name on this: every soul crawling Earth’s crust stands revealed as spiritual cripples! Bent! Warped! Bloated minds! Stunted hungers! So-called ‘whole’ beings? A teeming mass of defectives—packed shoulder-to-shoulder till breath itself chokes! Undeniable!”

“To put it plainly—isn’t it said that even without them you have seven quirks, and with them forty-eight? Unsightly, trivial habits persist no matter how much others ridicule them. Or consider when such habits hinder one’s advancement or trouble others—even after resolving to quit through prayers to gods and buddhas or swearing oaths in newspaper ads, if one still cannot abandon these bad habits, does this not directly demonstrate that one’s own mind lies beyond one’s control? Does this not reveal a deep-rooted manifestation of psychiatric episodes—the inability to correct errors in one’s own mind through willpower alone? Or when tears flow despite one’s resolve not to weep? Even when recognizing a situation doesn’t warrant anger, if one still flares up and loses all sense of context—doesn’t this expose the mind’s frailty in failing to self-correct from temporary psychological imbalance?”

Beyond these lay countless tendencies—obsessiveness, capriciousness, moodiness, fickleness, forgetfulness, nervousness, various indulgences, assorted madnesses, sundry addictions, perverse psychologies—so that among every person one encountered, whether acquainted or stranger, there existed none who did not bear some degree of maddening inclination. There existed none who did not possess some inadequacy in the workings of their mind. In other words, there existed none who were not humans differing by mere fifty or a hundred steps from psychiatric patients. As evidence of this, if one were to point out those people’s weaknesses—their mental inadequacies—anyone would either startle and blush, protest with veins bulging, or roll up their sleeves and confront you. This stemmed from the same psychology as a madman insisting he wasn’t mad—utterly absurd to the extreme, yet an unavoidable aspect of human sentiment....And if they left these unavoidable aspects of human sentiment as they were and let them run wild, those psychiatric tendencies began to seem perfectly normal. Let alone if one were to bestow upon them the currently fashionable gentlemanly treatment—their pathological tendencies would only intensify all the more, becoming increasingly inescapable. And once they eventually became absolutely unstoppable, these manifested in society as family tragedies and criminal incidents. If they were minor, social sanctions; if they became severe, they fell into the hands of the law. Even then, those who remained incapable of reflection—like clattering automobiles with failed brakes—ended up being labeled as some variety of lunatic and hauled off to mental hospitals.

“I don’t want there to be any misunderstanding—I’m certainly not saying this is a bad thing.” “I haven’t the slightest intention of insulting you lords of all creation—but when these so-called gentlemen and ladies, born or conditioned as they are, encounter psychiatric patients whose minds differ from their own by fifty steps from a hundred, they capriciously despise or fear them.” “Because they remain utterly convinced that they alone possess flawless minds without a shred of psychiatric tendencies—no matter what anyone says—I can’t help feeling compelled to mock them.” “…I find myself driven to defend these innocent psychiatric patients who endure every manner of cruel discrimination from such gentlemen and ladies.”

"In other words, when observed in this manner, the inability to distinguish between ordinary people and madmen becomes no different from being unable to distinguish between those inside a prison and those walking outside. To put it plainly, those who group together villains not yet blatant enough to be confined within red bricks and madmen are what we call ordinary people... or rather, gentlemen and ladies." "Of course, this constitutes a form of harsh language. It was truly an utterly regrettable manner of speaking—one could call it nothing short of rude and improper—but since a fact remained a fact through and through, there was no helping it. This observational standpoint had to be adopted because conducting genuine scientific research on mental illness proved impossible otherwise—just as all medical studies could not be accomplished without first establishing the perspective that humans were mere animals—and thus there was no alternative." "'If,' I continued, 'by any chance there exists someone who declares with confidence, "I alone am not a madman—",'" "'If there exists anyone who harbors such confidence as to declare, "I am a human possessing an absolutely flawless mind!", then I bid you come to me at any time.'" "'That individual will be admitted as a research patient at this university at government expense.'" "'After all,' I concluded with a dry chuckle, 'that type of patient is precisely what's needed for the students' lectures...'"

The sun spawns this infinite horde of psychiatric patients across the entire earth and continues its eternal, silent liberation therapy. Thus did humankind—those half-mad beings beneath beasts and insects—come through long ages to recognize themselves as a mass of lunatics, whereupon they fashioned meticulous constructs like religion, morality, law, and “red” or “blue” ideologies while proclaiming: “Let us cease mutual recklessness… abandon these strange antics.” “Therefore I too have fashioned a miniature model and—with all due presumption—attempt to conduct ‘drug-free liberation therapy’ as proxy for Mister Sun.” “We pursue truly scientific research and treatment of mental illness founded upon the observational principle that ‘all humanity are madmen.’”

“……What kind… What kind of psychiatric patients does that liberation therapy field accommodate?… That I still don’t know.” “Eventually, I plan to select and accommodate patients who can suitably serve as experimental material for my theories… the principles of this new mental science… but…” “……What kind of theory… the content of the mental science I have advocated…” “That’s an extremely formidable question—it isn’t something that can be fully explained in a single morning or evening.” “However, in short, I can confidently assert that it is an approach that completely overturns the research methods for mental illness up to this day from their very foundations.” “First, by re-examining the functions of human brain matter from square one, we will correct from their very foundations the conventional superstitious theory that ‘the brain is the seat of thought.’” “Then, we will clarify the hereditary function of the mind that reflects upon this new ‘function of brain matter.’” “Thus, I wish to attempt a therapeutic method applying my unique psychological suggestions and stimuli, gathering only the most comprehensible and intriguing specimens of psychiatric patients—those observed and diagnosed through the established disciplines of psych anatomy, psych physiology, and psychopathology.” “What kind of specimens will gather… what kind of uproar will commence—even I myself cannot predict.” “Ha ha ha….”

“However, let me clarify for the record—it would be most inconvenient if I alone, the one conducting this experiment, were to be misdiagnosed as some mentally sound, harmless simpleton.” Once that sun began blazing forth its scorching light across the entire grand liberation therapy field for psychiatric patients named Hell, it showed no sign of stopping. Even if one were to think of adding soy sauce at a reasonable point... it seemed to possess no such leisure, continuing to scorch everything endlessly, glaring and sizzling without cease. In the same way, once I began studying madmen, I became unable to think of anything else. Just as people beginning to urinate in the street continue pissing away until their bladders run dry—whether a lord passes by or a policeman arrives—prepared to face execution or fines, I too persisted relentlessly.

“Therefore, though other madmen across this earth may be cured, I alone shall never fully recover from my mental aberration.” “This much I can guarantee beyond doubt.” ... Absolute Detective Novel The brain is not the seat of thought.

＝＝＝Dr. Masaki’s Doctoral Thesis Contents＝＝＝

A reporter.

“What?” “Why hasn’t my doctoral thesis ‘Brain Matter Theory’ been announced to the academic community… Ha ha ha.” “Don’t mock me.” “I’m not the sort to withhold publication out of fear of controversy.” “The truth is, I’ve kept it because there are a few additions I want to make.” “Are you asking me to discuss its contents?” “Yeah.” “Oh, I’ve no reason not to.” “…But if I tell you, you’ll print it immediately.” “Actually, after your paper ran that article about my ‘Earth’s Surface as a Grand Liberation Therapy Field for Madmen,’ I faced considerable trouble.” “They called it a self-promotional piece—seems all manner of parties were seething over it.”

“What nonsense.” “I remain unruffled.” “No matter what they say, I won’t bat an eye—though I do pity how that peace-pandering university president and timorous dean turn pale with anxiety whenever I voice even moderately bold assertions.” “Ever since Mr.Tsurukawa’s ‘Universal Gold Reversion’ research and Mr.Akai’s ‘rejuvenation surgery,’ Kyushu University has suffered this misperception of housing nothing but charlatans.” “And now this ‘Brain Matter Theory’ of mine—why, it fans into towering flames a conflagration already burning from our prior liberation therapy discussions…”

“Hmph. So you want me to talk because you won’t write it down? A reporter’s promise not to write—now that’s a rare pledge. You certain you can keep it? Well… very well then. Now then… a cigar… a fine Havana. Consider this payment for my lecture—and compensation for suppressing your article. Rather cheap, don’t you think? Ha ha ha ha! I’ve time to spare today. Might even turn up the intensity.” “…Incidentally—do you read detective novels?” “Nah… don’t.” “You really ought to read them. A man who doesn’t read detective novels—the very nerve center of modern literature—can hardly call himself modern!” “What… I’ve had my fill of that stuff… Uhhahaha!” “How impertinent! How impertinent! And yet your profession remains that of a newspaperman, does it not? Ahahahaha! Oh, my apologies, my apologies!”

“Well then—care to hear the most groundbreaking true detective story I’ve been hoarding here? Truth is, I’ve been working up a draft to submit to some science rag or other, but I might just let you take a test listen to it first. The plot’s complexity and subtlety—paired with its deliciously ironic resolution—are probably unprecedented in all of history. And should any similar cases exist out there, this comes with an exceptionally rare premium guaranteeing you’ll never lay eyes on them again…”

“Nonsense! Don’t try to pull one over on me. This has a crucial connection to my Brain Matter Theory I just mentioned. You see, detective novels are essentially a sport for the brain matter. The criminal’s brain matter and the detective’s brain matter employ every arcane technique to play games of tag and endless back-and-forth. Isn’t it the very essence of detective novels to drag readers along through the seductive power of illusions, hallucinations, and twisted notions that arise in the process? Eh? Right?”

“But here’s the kicker: My detective novel is a whole different beast from those hackneyed, run-of-the-mill plots you’re used to. In other words, it’s a tale where ‘the brain matter itself’ chases after ‘the brain matter itself’… the supreme, absolute scientific detective novel in all the cosmos. Moreover, when I reveal the earth-shattering secret behind this absolute scientific detective novel—the very trick that makes two billion human brains gasp in shock—it turns out to be exactly identical to the central theme of my ‘Brain Matter Theory.’ Isn’t that spectacular?”

“What?” “I don’t understand.” “Ha ha ha ha ha.” “Of course you don’t understand.” “I haven’t told you anything yet, you know.” “Ha ha.”

“Ah, sure, sure.” “I don’t mind if you take shorthand notes.” “All you need to do is wait until I formally publish my ‘Brain Matter Theory’ as my doctoral dissertation before printing it in the newspaper.” “If you like, I could even make revisions afterward.” “Wouldn’t it be more convenient to publish this as my original creation rather than an interview...?”

“I must warn you upfront—whether you’ll comprehend this detective’s true story or not lies beyond my guarantee.” “After all, it’s an absolute, supreme detective novel where ‘brain matter’ chases ‘brain matter,’ you see.” “The solution stands perfectly intact from the very outset, yet readers will never grasp it.” “You might only sense a swirling chaos of outlandish hallucinations, delusions, and perverse notions in utter disarray… but that’s precisely what makes this brain matter novel—the pinnacle of its kind—so exquisite! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!”

“Now then… The formulaic pattern of detective novels lies in first slamming an impenetrably difficult riddle at readers’ heads from the very outset—whacking them square between the eyes with a single disorienting shock. Moreover, it stands to reason that a mystery capable of utterly confounding the ‘human brain matter’ must inherently be one directly concerning ‘brain matter’ itself.”

“Exactly as I thought!! …I suppose I’ll give you a scare.” “Ha ha ha ha ha ha.” “What need is there to conceal it? That very ‘brain matter’ is modern science’s greatest enigma—a supreme deity of cruelty and deviance taken to their extremes.” “Among all human organs, it alone remains an unknowable entity—a colossal Sphinx sculpted from protein.” “It was none other than the monster itself that ceaselessly made two billion skulls resound from dawn till dusk.” The monster called human brain matter sat enthroned in the body’s highest place, driving every organ like servants while voraciously extracting the finest blood and most superior nutrients. Where brain matter commanded, it had to be done; what brain matter desired, it had to be sought. The crux was this—did humans exist for brain matter’s sake, or had brain matter been created for humans? No matter how one pondered it, no answer materialized… And yet this very brain matter—the revered deity of every bodily organ, humanity’s dictatorial monarch—exerted nothing less than such thoroughgoing tyranny.

However, setting that aside, there was one truly baffling matter in all this. To put it plainly: when one subjected to rigorous scientific investigation the fact of what role this solid mass of protein—which called itself “brain matter”—had played within the human body throughout history, or what purpose it even served… it all ultimately converged on a single point: “We do not know.” Conversely, this monster called brain matter had not allowed the very brain matter of scholars across all ages and nations to perceive even a speck of its own true function. […] Not only that […] the brain matter itself radiated supernatural abilities, mystic power, and sorcery in all directions—powers so extraordinary that one could never imagine them emanating from a mere one or two kilograms of material—utterly scrambling all scientific deductive research conducted by those scientists’ very own brain matter from start to finish. To put it more succinctly, one might have described it as "the brain matter striving to prevent the brain matter itself from comprehending its own functions." Consequently, this brain matter—while gradually rendering nonsensical the very core of modern human culture it itself created, reducing all aspects to peripheral nerve-like trivialities, corrupting, degrading, confounding, and driving them to the brink of collapse—nonchalantly coiled like a serpent within the cranial cavity, thereby becoming none other than the ultimate demon itself: the brain matter itself.

Of course, this is not my own brand of boast or nonsense. I assert this on the honor of my profession...

“What… Are you saying the brain matter is where thinking occurs…?”

“That’s right.” “Everyone thinks that, you know.” “Not only modern leading scientists, but people of all types and classes across the entire world—proletariat and bourgeoisie alike—all live under the belief that they think with their brain matter.” They were utterly convinced that radios, airplanes, the theory of relativity, jazz, safety razors, Red theory, poison gas—absolutely everything—were all produced from this lump of protein weighing between 1,200 and 1,900 grams.

Admittedly, when one dissects a human corpse and examines what we call brain matter, such reasoning appears undeniably sound. The cerebrum, cerebellum, medulla oblongata, pineal gland and similar structures comprise grotesquely shaped cells layered endlessly in immeasurable quantities—all interconnected through fantastically transformed nerve cell extensions that reach into every last corner of the body’s thirty trillion cells. Researching these communication pathways ultimately reveals how the entire cellular network integrating all human body parts forms a meticulous, precise and orderly web-like structure centered upon the brain matter. Thus we arrive at the conclusion that whatever spirit or life consciousness governs all human actions might very well be sequestered within this brain matter. At minimum, current scientific consensus deems it permissible to assert that “brain matter constitutes the seat of thought.”

Such a way of thinking had now become an unshakable conviction—or rather, common sense—for all of humanity. As for this fact that "brain matter is the organ that thinks," it had reached a state where no one—no matter where one searched—would theatrically doubt it. Modern civilization’s dazzling cultural artifacts—down to every last needle and sheet of paper—had all been conceived by this "brain matter that thinks things." Yet even were one to proclaim this in a grand speech, there would not be a single soul crying "No, no!"—such was the extent to which our world had become steeped in brain-supremacist ideology.

Now then… It was here that my brain matter detective novel unleashed a young detective genius—one who cast a scornful sidelong glance at this global trend—alongside an unprecedented express-style grand doctor of brain matter science. "In one fell swoop," [the story] demolishes global superstitions surrounding brain matter that had persisted until now—exposing under science’s blazing light this great demon ‘brain matter’s’ bizarre workings…the dead end of nonsense…the simple yet lucid illusion one might call Anpontan’s bottomless idiocy—then smacks readers’ heads with a resounding *gwaaan!* strike…sending them flying clear out of consciousness with a home run…That’s my plot…but who knows…whether readers will swallow this or choke…"

“What.” I still don’t understand… I need to hear a bit more…

“What do you mean… You’re saying it’s a fantasy novel…?” “Preposterous…” “Did I not clearly state from the outset that this is a ‘scientific detective fact-based novel’?” “If you were to incorporate even a shred of fantasy like this, wouldn’t the entire work’s intrigue evaporate entirely?” “Of course it would… Since this contains not one iota of nonsense from beginning to end, you may listen with full confidence.” “You’ll come to understand this is no trifling matter contained within.” “Now listen closely…”

Now, this young genius detective and grand doctor of brain-matter science was a handsome youth of about twenty whom I had provisionally named Anpontan Pokan. “Listen… Of course he’s a real person.” Moreover, despite that handsome youth possessing an unparalleled intellect, he suffered an extremely dangerous hereditary mental breakdown and was thus admitted to this department’s affiliated hospital shortly after enrolling in this university.

“Oh come on… It’s not nonsense, I tell you… You’re such a terribly suspicious reader… If you think it’s fiction, I’ll introduce you to the man himself anytime.” “It’s no trouble at all—he’s just over there in Room 7 across the way.” “Oi.” When he called out “Pokan-kun…”, the side profile of him turning around in surprise was unbearably cute.

Now, this Seaboy—Anpontan Pokan-kun—after suffering a hereditary episode that left him unconscious, upon finally regaining his senses, soon realized he had cleanly forgotten not only his birthplace and parents’ names but even his own name. Therefore, for the time being he had received from me the honorary title of Dr.Anpontan Pokan; yet being naturally sharp-minded, Dr.Anpontan Pokan himself seemed deeply troubled by this fact, pacing day and night without pause across the artificial stone floor of his hospital room while fixating solely on matters concerning his own brain matter. ……I don’t know… I don’t know. ...What has my brain matter been doing all this time... What was it thinking? Or Is my brain matter controlling my entire body... Or is my entire body controlling my brain matter... I don’t know I don’t know—muttering such things, he would scrub at his wildly overgrown hair, thump the back of his head with his fists kon-kon, and without resting for even a minute, pace round and round the room.

However, as these episodes steadily escalated to their peak, Dr.Pokan eventually came to a halt in the middle of the artificial stone floor covering the entire room and began peering about restlessly with a look of bewilderment. Then, from within his own wild, unkempt hair, he grabbed hold of something invisible and pantomimed slamming it down onto the floor with all his might. Then, pointing at whatever he had just smashed onto the floor, he launched into an impassioned, gesticulating lecture about brain matter—but as he became enraptured by his own oration and reached the peak of his fervor, he suddenly raised one leg and pantomimed stomping to obliterate that invisible something he had moments earlier plucked from his own head and dashed against the floor—all while groaning, rolling his eyes back, and collapsing onto the floor. After sinking into a state of total unconsciousness for some thirty to forty hours and sleeping like the dead, he once again rose up in true Anpontan Pokan fashion, vigorously rubbing his eyes. And then, just as before, he paced round and round the room while repeating "I don't know, I don't know." In the midst of this, he once again took out something invisible from his head and smashed it onto the floor beneath his feet. He looked around in all directions and, raising his fist, began his lecture on brain matter. Crushing some incomprehensible thing on the floor, groaning and collapsing... This had become the daily routine of the young genius detective Mr.Anpontan Pokan.

Now, what was fascinating was Dr.Pokan’s rants.

When Dr. Pokan gave his lectures, he seemed to imagine himself standing amidst a bustling crowd at some busy thoroughfare—perhaps a streetcar intersection or similar location. Assuming a stance like a traffic officer—spreading his arms wide and glaring around at the crowds before and behind, to the left and right—he would suddenly begin brandishing his fist in the air while mustering a shrill voice.

“……Stop!……” “……Stop!……” “Trams, automobiles, bicycles, motorcycles, buses, trucks, rickshaws—EVERYTHING STOP!...” “Gentlemen, ladies, *moga*, *mobo*, salarymen, career women, bourgeoisie, proletariat, pickpockets, police officers—none of you may move!” “……All of you are facing grave danger at this very moment!” “……All of you are walking right now—at this very moment—thinking with your brain matter!……Using your brain matter’s discernment to distinguish a traffic officer’s ‘go’ and ‘stop,’ differentiate the blue and red of signal flags, critique the latest fashions in display windows, learn of new stars from posters, discover conversation topics in evening news postings, stay wary of pickpockets, avoid creditors, track the fragrance of *It*… all while swelling that brain matter’s sensations to bursting—stepping with cultured pride… or so you imagine!”

“……That is dangerous!” he proclaimed. “He warns it’s an emergency! …A brain matter emergency…” “Behold. Hearken! Be astonished! Be appalled… …All two billion modern humans are utter fools like yourselves. Fools who go to post offices to ask about their own new addresses. Panicked fools who shout their own numbers into telephones. Imbeciles deluded into thinking ‘brain matter’ is ‘where thinking occurs.’ And it is your own brain matter—proudly shouldering such preposterous hallucinations and delusions while elevating these illusions into supreme principles within this deranged arena of competition, where twisted notions like ‘The head is the ultimate capital’ and ‘Modernity is the speed age of brains’ dominate—that drives this horde of trams, cars, and motorcycles night and day, plunging human culture ever deeper into a chaotic realm of agonized suffocation!”

How could anyone watch this with such detached composure?

“……Behold.” “Hearken!” “Be astonished!” “Be appalled….” These were Anpontan Pokan’s slogans. A vilification of human culture. The collapse of brain matter civilization. The complete reconstruction of materialistic scientific thought.

Pokan declared.

“……‘The brain that thinks’ is humanity’s greatest enemy.” “……It is the supreme demon among demons in all creation!……At the dawn of time, after making Eve eat the fruit of knowledge, Satan’s serpent further infiltrated the hollow of human skulls to curse Adam and Eve’s descendants—coiling itself in hiding……That serpent became the predecessor of ‘the brain that thinks’……Thus……”

“……Open your eyes…… “……Confront this shudder-inducing demonic spectacle of the brain matter!”

“……And liquidate all superstitions and delusions concerning brain matter!”

Human brain matter proclaims of itself: "The brain is the organ that thinks." "The brain is the architect of scientific civilization." "The brain is the omnipotent and omniscient god within the material world." ...And thus... While thus brazenly usurping the title of supreme universal authority, the brain sits enthroned at the body's apex, driving every organ like enslaved subjects. It extracts the purest blood and richest nutrients from every extremity to attain a monarch's ultimate hubris. All while endlessly elevating its own dominion, day by day and step by step, it drags humanity—those superstitious worshippers of cerebral supremacy—down into corruption's abyss.

Behold the monstrosity of this *History of the Brain’s Sin*!

This Anpontan Pokan—having researched world history from every conceivable angle—was able to arrive at the following irrefutable conclusion.

He declared……that *History of the Brain’s Sin* could be distilled into five items……thus……. “Made humanity conceited as beings superior to gods” This became the first page of *History of the Brain’s Sin*. “Made humanity rebel against the natural world” This formed the second page of that *History*. “Drove humanity back into the world of beasts” This comprised the third page of that *History*. “Drove humanity to madly circle through a nihilistic world of mere material and instinct”

This was the fourth page of that *History*.

*“Drove humanity down the slope of self-destruction”*

And that was the end of it.

Facts spoke louder than anything. A look through medical history made it clear... The first person to discover what we call human brain matter within a human corpse was the great scientist known as the founder of the revival of Western medicine, Mr.Hepomenias. However, the great brain of Mr.Hepomenias—that luminary of modern science—employed an exceedingly bold and ingenious trick to seal away under absolute secrecy the functions of the dead person’s brain matter he himself had discovered.

In other words, Mr.Hepomenias’s brain—as if declaring “Who could possibly discern my true nature?”—pitted the “dead person’s brain matter,” its ashen-white coils coiling sluggishly, against the “living brain matter” within his own thickly-haired skull, thereby initiating an earnest battle of all-out deductive reasoning. ……Hmm. What on earth was this supposed to be good for? For what purpose did the Creator Deity deign to place this ash-white serpent coiled upon itself within the attic of the skull…….

This difficult problem tormented and tortured Mr. Hepomenias’s mind for days and nights on end.

Haaah... This lump of protein could be seen as a factory producing tears and nasal mucus, or perhaps as something akin to octopus waste. Judging from its location in the attic of the architectural structure called a human, one might think it was a storage tank for precious nutrients; imagining how it coiled sluggishly in curves matching those of the small intestine, one could also consider it some sort of digestive organ. ……Hmm. What was it... He didn’t know, didn’t know...

In such a manner, it made him rack his brains, caused him agonizing distress, and plunged him into dazed exhaustion. In the end, this left him utterly unable to make heads or tails of anything, and then caused the inside of Mr.Hepomenias’s skull to throb dully with pain. There, the great genius scientist Mr.Hepomenias had at last splendidly fallen into the trap of his own brain’s trickery. And then he struck the desk and leapt up.

“I’ve got it… The brain matter is the organ that thinks! It’s because I overused that brain matter that my head started hurting like this…” ……And……. Thereupon, that scientist immediately took up a scalpel and sliced the entire corpse—from which the brain matter had been extracted—into sections one hundred-thousandth of a millimeter thick. As soon as he confirmed that the thirty trillion cells forming every organ of the human body—down to the last particle in every corner—were interconnected by threads of nerve cells centered around the brain matter, he cradled the dead person’s brain matter in both hands and dashed out into the street in one breath.

“...I’ve got it!” “I’ve got it!” “I’ve got it all figured out!...”

The claim that divine providence governs life’s origin is a lie. God is nothing more than something conceived by human brain matter. ……Behold this brain matter……. The origin of life resides within this twelve-hundred- to nineteen-hundred-gram mass of protein. Our mental consciousness is nothing but a form of chemical energy stimulus produced through the decomposition of this protein. ……Everything is by the brain matter’s will…….

“The brain matter discovered by science is indeed the omniscient and omnipotent god of the real world.” ……And…… The progressive minds of the time—utterly fed up with Christian superstitions and the clergy’s moral decay—resonated with this revelation in thunderous approval the moment they heard it. They swallowed whole Mr. Hepomenias’s deluded theories as their own creed. They succumbed to the superstition, premium included, of the illusion that “brain matter is where thinking occurs.” “That’s right! That’s right!” “There’s no God in this world.” “Everything is nothing but material interactions.” “We’ll forge a new materialist culture through the chemical actions of the protein in our skulls…!”

……And……. Having thus neatly erased God from the human world, the "brain that thinks" proceeded to incite humanity's rebellion against the natural order. It then began crafting a materialist culture for mankind. The brain matter first devised every conceivable weapon for humans, facilitating mutual slaughter. It developed all medical techniques to subvert natural health practices, multiplied the sickly population, and enabled unrestricted birth control. It set machinery whirring across the globe, constricting the world's vastness.

It devised every kind of light and drove out the sun, the moon, and the stars. And thus it made humans—children of nature—crawl one after another into houses rigidly constructed of iron and stone. It made them breathe gas and electricity and hardened their arteries. It made them apply makeup with lead and earth and play with mechanical dolls. And thus it taught them how to use alcohol, nicotine, opium, digestives, cardiac stimulants, hypnotics, aphrodisiacs, chastity disinfectants, and poisons—making them believe the unnatural perverse beauty produced by such chaotic concoctions constituted humanity’s true culture. And thus it conditioned humanity to become unable to survive even a single day without unnaturalness.

……Not only that……. The “brain that thinks”—having expelled ‘God’ from the human world and subsequently banished ‘nature’—simultaneously stripped humanity of all natural psychological manifestations that promised proliferation, evolutionary advancement, and comforting happiness. Namely, it declared all these things—parental love, fraternal love, romantic love, chastity, fidelity, shame, social obligation, human compassion, sincerity, conscience, and every last one of them—to be “irrational when viewed through materialist science.” Under the illusion that “therefore it is unnatural,” this brain compelled them to reject these things, thereby bringing forth a world of individualism consisting solely of matter and bestial instincts. And thus it decentralized human culture day by day, self-defiled it, drove it into neurasthenic decline and psychological derangement, until finally—in the nihilistic world where all humanity had been spiritually driven to self-destruction and suicide—it reduced them to nonsensical ghosts wandering the crossroads, yearning after red and blue lights.

"The brain matter that thinks is thus, unbeknownst to itself, attempting to bring about humanity’s extinction."

Behold the cold-bloodedness and cruelty of this brain matter culture.

Could this be left unchecked?

Not only that……. "The brain that thinks thus thrived in its malevolence to bury each and every human being in an illusory void of delusion, while subjecting all of humanity’s minds to an elaborate sleight of hand, tossing them about like dried leaves and dust." "And at the same time, I... Anpontan Pokan... attempted to thoroughly dazzle the detective’s eye." ……Behold…….

Behold how countless are the brain matter’s tragicomedies—tossed about by the brain matter’s tricks—that roll and tumble right before your very noses! Discern how earnestly the “nonsense play of brain matter” is unfolding on the stage of the entire world.

...Behold... "The brain that thinks thus reigns supreme over human culture." ...While boasting there exists nothing it cannot conceive—penetrating even the universe's profoundest mysteries... it dominates and directs even the uttermost depths of scientific culture. ...But consider this... What manner of absurdity is this—that while this "brain matter capable of conceiving all things" piles and arrays its own devised scientific doctrines and materialist cultural spawn across Earth's surface in such eye-dazzling, mind-boggling profusion, it leaves rotting in doubt's pitch-black darkness not a single crucial, foundational study concerning "brain matter itself"? What manner of absurdity is this—that the brain matter plumbing the universe's deepest mysteries has left unconsidered just one thing: its own self? What wondrously strange phenomenon—that among all theories and papers produced by scientists to this day, there exists not one document accurately explaining brain matter's workings?

Not only you... but also the brain matter of scientists worldwide who represent your cerebral interests—what foolishness it is that they had failed to notice this contradiction, this absurdity, to this very day. ...Behold... Human brain matter had extended research on the human body to every last corner. Had they not divided their efforts across all domains—anatomy, physiology, pathology, heredity—penetrating into the minutest details? Had they not similarly compelled research to compete across every conceivable medical field—internal medicine, surgery, otolaryngology, dermatology, ophthalmology, and dentistry—in the treatment of illness?

And amidst all this—what a half-baked oversight it was to leave rotting in primeval darkness only the brain matter that devised such research and studies concerning that very brain matter! What cerebral negligence—that not a single university worldwide established departments for disciplines essential to psychiatric research like psychoanatomy, psychophysiology, psychopathology, or psychogenetics, instead relegating all treatment of so-called "brain diseases" or "mental illnesses" to doctors throwing up their hands! And what colossal ineptitude—that these supremely wise human brains consigned one after another to the gaping maw of oblivion such crucial brain-related questions as: "Where and how does human life—or life consciousness—reside?" "How do hallucinations manifest?" "What exactly constitutes premature dementia?"—matters any thinking person would find wondrous!

Just as a diviner cannot divine their own fate, the fact that brain matter cannot contemplate itself had become accepted as self-evident truth, with none daring to question it. What else could this be but brain matter's tragicomedy? What else could this be but the grand nonsense theater of brains being manipulated by brain matter itself? For more immediate and poignant examples, consider what is vulgarly termed "crying palsy" or "laughing palsy." This condition reduces all emotional responses—whether anger, shock, or any affective state—to a single track of either weeping or laughter, obliterating all other expressive pathways. Yet brain matter doggedly compels scientists worldwide to explain this very illness through its obstinate "brain thinks" doctrine. Thus these oath-bound scientists across the globe explain such stroke symptoms as: "The entire brain has been paralyzed by hemorrhage. Only that solitary region governing emotions like 'weeping' or 'laughing' survives intact. Therefore all emotions arising in such individuals must channel through this lone cluster of nerve cells—either crying or laughing—with no alternative outlet... Given our foundational premise that 'the brain is where thought occurs,' they can offer no other explanation—can they?"

However, unfortunately, when one examines the results of pathological autopsies performed on the brain matter of such stroke patients, they always turn out to be the complete opposite of what one would expect. It is not the entirety of the brain matter that becomes affected by cerebral hemorrhage. In many cases, it remains limited to just a single small, narrow location within the brain matter—is this not supremely ironic? Does this not tragically reduce everything to a farcical play of brain matter where neither tears nor laughter can manifest? An even more ironically bizarre example lies in what we call somnambulism. This condition naturally gets dismissed and avoided by scientists of the Brain Almighty Sect as an incomprehensible disease beyond their ken—yet these very somnambulists sometimes stage miraculous feats to make utter fools of those scientists' prized brains... For instance, such patients demonstrate extraordinary wisdom and skill during their episodes—capabilities unimaginable as products of their own minds—accomplishing tremendous tasks beyond normal human capacity. ......Not only that—when these individuals awaken come morning, they invariably revert to their original Kerorin-like simpleton selves without retaining a single trace of those splendid memories in their brain matter. Thus does it clog—absolutely and permanently—every last shred of judgment in those specialists who superstitiously cling to fallacies about brains being "the seat of thought," "the locus of sensation," or "the vault of memory," reducing them to a state of complete fecal obstruction.

“It’s utterly unthinkable by the human brain!” Is it not terrifying how this makes them shriek in bewildered screams? Is this not an inescapable theater of horror staged by brain matter? Yet all scientists who presume themselves priests of the Materialism Sect and missionaries of the Religion of Scientific Omnipotence remain unrepentant, bellowing their hymns to cerebral supremacy.

"The size of the brain matter indicates the evolutionary level of its owner, and the number of its convolutions demonstrates their degree of cultural development." "In other words, humanity exists for the sake of its large, developed brain matter, and that brain matter in turn exists for the purpose of thinking." "Therefore, brain matter is the god of culture, the creator deity of the scientific world, the guardian deity of the Materialism Sect." They desperately defended the authority of their own brain matter by revering these so-called fallacious doctrines more than scripture itself—yet under these very scientists' microscopes, lower animals lacking both heads and posteriors not only accurately discerned hot and cold or showed food preferences, but even clearly demonstrated weather forecasting abilities too acute for human brain matter to approach! Was this not delightful? Moreover, such lower animals might not speak with their mouths, but through their bleats and gestures...

“You can think even without brain matter.” “Our entire bodies are brain matter indeed.” “We transform the whole of our brain matter precisely as it is—shaping it into limbs, torsos, ears, eyes, mouths, noses, digestive and excretory organs, reproductive organs, and so forth—using each part for diverse purposes indeed.”

“You have merely divided such functions into specialized roles and assigned them to separate organs.” “Your very limbs are properly thinking things through, you know.” “Your buttocks can see and hear as well, you know.” “If you pinch your thigh, only your thigh hurts, you know.” “If a flea bites you, only that spot itches, you know.” “The brain matter feels neither pain nor itch—it’s utterly insensible, you know.” “Do you still not understand?”

“Ahahahahahaha” “Ohohohohohohohoho” “Ihihihihihihi” Wasn’t this sheer lunacy—their convulsive laughter? What else could this be but brain matter’s satirical farce? What else but brain matter’s grand charade? Yet even amidst this materialist culture’s zenith, grotesque spectacles and mystical dramas from antiquity began manifesting wholesale. And they came flooding forth in such multitudes—each fresh apparition jeering at human intellect—was this not exquisite mockery?

In the golden age of materialist capitalism, right in the midst of a metropolis fortified by scientific culture, dead people made phone calls and strangers appeared together in photographs. Or jewels sucking away beauties' lifespans and demonic railroad crossings menacing trains were one thing, but then there was the ghost of Dai Nao caressing the walls of Amerongen Castle while sighing for the old Kaiser to hear, or King Tutankhamun’s mummy cursing Egyptian explorers. Indeed, even Sherlock Holmes—that titan of scientific deduction, founder of materialist detective methods through fingerprints, footprints, and tobacco ash analysis—had ultimately been dragged into these sorts of bizarre phenomena in his twilight years, breathing his last while engrossed in psychical research... Not only that, but he reportedly spoke from beyond the grave to his surviving wife and children using sound waves that required no etheric medium—such was the extent of it. Everyone exclaimed how strange it all was, but there wasn’t a single person who could definitively assert whether such facts could exist or not. Even if they existed, it would ultimately devolve into a futile debate, so it had been clear from the start that they would end up at an impasse, mutually suspecting each other’s brain matter. And then—Ah, no, that wasn’t it. Was this not the current state of affairs where, finding that approach also futile, they had kneaded through all manner of reasoning and imagination until finally letting out screams of "What in blazes was this—the brain matter contemplating brain matter itself?!" only to repeat these slippery back-and-forths akin to some rundown vaudeville's nonsensical repartee?

How about it, my friends... That’s precisely how matters stand. "The 'pathology of human brain matter' that should have been researched above all else... Look how all psychiatry's crucial foundational issues—those very problems that should form its central core—are being reduced to a state of fecal obstruction one after another by this so-called 'thinking brain'! Is this not bringing every psychiatrist on earth and every psychiatric hospital's diagnoses and treatments to a complete standstill amidst derisive laughter at their incompetence and futility? Is this not abandoning countless psychiatric patients to a world of scorn and abuse where they can never be saved—not now, not ever? Is this not manifesting an asylum hell across every inch of this earth's surface?"

"What else could this be but the great 'Brain Matter’s Mischief Play'?" "What else could this be but the grand finale of a colossal horror-nonsense play, staged by 'brain matter that thinks' upon 'brain matter that thinks' itself?" Let those who would applaud do so.

Let those who would cheer do so. Let those who would cry, cry. Let those who would laugh, laugh.

I—Anpontan Pokan—no sooner realized the current state of this Brain Matter Culture than my teeth began chattering uncontrollably. No sooner had I become aware of my own brain matter's chilling detachment—secretly mocking this brain-matter society's terror-inducing spectacle—than the bones in both kneecaps rattled as if about to come loose. Having shattered this brain matter's trick and overturned from its very foundations the worldwide materialist-scientific superstition regarding brain matter, I could not help but halt the production of this grand horror-nonsense play so utterly cruel and tragic.

I—Anpontan Pokan—herein rose to my feet. I—Anpontan Pokan—resolutely tightened the cord around my arm. I—Anpontan Pokan—fiercely applying the supreme detective techniques into which I had poured my life’s blood and soul, pressing forward in pursuit across infinite spans of spacetime, finally succeeded in thoroughly exposing the true nature of this so-called Great Demon of Brain Matter…the essence of that ‘Cursed Idol of Materialist Culture’. The great nightmare of all humankind… To awaken them from the superstitions and obsessions surrounding “brain matter that thinks,” I—Anpontan Pokan—had at last arrived at the “Absolute Supreme Great Truth.”

……And yet……this Great Truth—precisely because it was far too simple and ordinary—was an astonishing Great Truth that had gone unnoticed by anyone. Since brain matter was first discovered, all those extraordinary brains—from Bacon, Locke, Darwin, Spencer, Bergson, and so forth—must have been none other than the very 'true activity of brain matter' that they themselves could not recognize. The 'great evil incantation of brain matter' that toys with and slaughters two billion living souls on earth was nothing but a single matchstick to burn it all away.

My friends! Rejoice and leap for joy! “Bravely leap up, do handstands, perform somersaults!” Foxtrot! Jidanda! Step away!

Kick away both traffic police and safety zones! The tyranny of brain matter spanning from antiquity to the present... Sing a triumphant song liberated from humanity’s final superstition! I—Anpontan Pokan—had finally pursued in this manner the great demon on earth right before your very eyes. I had tracked down to their very depths the tricks of this mysterious criminal—appearing and vanishing unpredictably, shape-shifting freely—this cruel and inhuman prankster. And now at this very moment—honored am I!—to slam before your eyes this great demon’s true form...Pokan’s own brain matter...and scream forth: ...Thus spake...

...Brain matter is not the seat of thought... ...Thus spake..."

×　　　　　　　　　　×　　　　　　　　　　× “Ah-hah-hah-hah-hah! How about it? Isn’t it exhilarating? Isn’t it lightning-fast? Isn’t it an absolute bravo? Isn’t this an ultra-express detective novel worthy of reducing two billion brains worldwide to rubble?” “What…? Still don’t understand…?….”

“Ahahahah! That’s because you still can’t break free from the habit of thinking with brain matter! It’s because that ‘spirit is matter’-style materialist scientific superstition remains stubbornly clinging to some corner of your heads!”

“Hearken.” The young celebrity detective Dr.Anpontan Pokan now continued such arguments while pointing at his own mud-smeared brain matter—which he had just slammed down upon the earth—and proceeded thus.

×　　　　　　　　　　×　　　　　　　　　　×

“...Behold...Listen...Be astonished...Be appalled.”

The truth behind this brain matter's trickery...the deviousness of a demon surpassing demons... We mankind had been ceaselessly manipulated by this 'brain matter that thinks' ever since Hepomenias—the first scientist to discover brain matter—unleashed it upon us. Day after day, night after night before this brain matter, we had labored under illusions—forced to prostrate our heads in worship...compelled to devote our entire physical and spiritual being in service. And thus, even the head of this very Anpontan Pokan who speaks these words had been but one such head among those countless bowed heads.

……However……the time has now come when this illusion must be shattered. The time has come when the illusion of Mr. Hepomenias—the first scientist to discover brain matter—must be rectified. Just as the brain matter of Pokan lying at Pokan’s feet must end up smeared in mud, the time has now come. ...Pokan, at this crossroads, proclaims to the world its first declaration. That is to say—the most cutting-edge scholarship...the final-stage scientific religion...I—Anpontan Pokan—have the honor to publicly present my Anpontan Pokan-style "Brain Matter Theory."

I—Anpontan Pokan—assert. "The proposition that 'a brain matter that thinks cannot conceive of a brain matter that thinks' must stand as an eternal axiom, just like the physical principle that 'two objects cannot occupy the same space at the same time.'" Therefore, this "brain matter that thinks"—which contemplates "brain matter that thinks"—has been tormented by the "ghost of brain matter": a delusion where Hepomenias, the first scientist to discover brain matter, misapprehended his own brain matter's function. And now, at this very moment, he stands on the brink of being slain by the ghost of his own brain matter.

Therefore, I—Anpontan Pokan—have boldly challenged this. ...The locus of thought resides not in brain matter... ...The seat of sensation lies not in brain matter either... ...Brain matter is naught but an insensate mass of solidified protein... ...Thus... ...This is unconscionable. "What could possibly amuse you so that you writhe laughing thus?"

“...Why are you all rolling about in the streets like that?”

“Why on earth are you crawling into police boxes?” “…clinging to utility poles!” “…kissing red postboxes! …Have you all suffered a mental breakdown?” “…Blah blah…?????….” “…Are you asking, ‘If not with brain matter, then where do you think?’…” “…Are you asking, ‘If not with brain matter, then where do you feel?’…” “…Are you asking, ‘Where does our spiritual consciousness reside?’… ‘How do we sustain our existence?’…”

"...Huh...?" "Is this not a problem that is not at all amusing? It is neither mysterious nor bizarre. Is this not an utterly mundane problem?" "Brush the mud off your pants." "Adjust your hats properly." "Straighten your collars and listen..." "Our spirit... or life consciousness is nowhere to be found. It fills every part of our entire bodies to the brim—no different from lower animals that lack brain matter." "If you pinch buttocks, buttocks hurt. When stomachs become empty, stomachs become empty."

It was extremely simple and clear. However, this alone might have been too simple and clear to be readily comprehensible, so allow me to break it down further: all that we are constantly and ceaselessly conscious of—every last one of our desires, emotions, willpower, memories, judgments, beliefs, and what have you—resided with absolute equality in each and every one of the thirty trillion cells comprising our entire bodies, all in precisely the same manner. Thus, brain matter was merely a cluster of cells tasked solely with the mediating function of reflexively interacting—without omission—the content of consciousness from each and every one of the entire body’s cells to each and every one of the entire body’s cells.

Red ideologists refer to each and every one of their party members as cells. In the same way that we view each and every cell as an individual human and liken the entire human body to a great metropolis, brain matter corresponds to the telephone exchange situated at its center. And thus one comes to understand that it cannot be anything other than this. ...If you still do not grasp it even now, then I—Anpontan Pokan—shall come along with you here. Traversing the utmost limits of time and space, you should once again retrace the painstaking traces of Pokan’s quest to uncover the true nature of brain matter.

First and foremost, to investigate from what place, under what reason, and how brain matter came to be born, you would ride alongside me—Anpontan Pokan—between the silver wings of Atama Airlines' ultra-speed aircraft "Inference," reserved exclusively for this purpose. Then, with engines roaring mightily as we took off from Atama Airfield, piercing through infinite time and space in one breath, you voyaged back 600 million years along the grand, majestic flow of universal evolution spread beneath your eyes in all its magnificence and solemnity.

Behold. ...the current world of humanity’s zenith would transform into a fleeting dream of the future as beneath your feet unfurled an elephantine realm from a million years past—where mammoths, Elephas, Stegodon and other titanic beasts roamed triumphant through their rightful epoch.

Then further still—retreating at ultra-speed through the Dragon World of a million years prior, then further back through the Bird World before that, further still through the Fish World before that, through the Shellfish World and Sponge World—each successive realm growing simpler in evolutionary degree until you arrived at the primordial age 600 million years past... How about that! The youthful vigor of this world where cataclysmic eruptions, great thunderstorms, colossal tidal waves, and massive earthquakes sent volcanic smoke, water vapor, and dust swirling upward one after another to blot out sun and moon—how about that! How about Earth’s vigor!

So take a drop of the low-salinity seawater that bubbles and drifts across this earth’s surface—maintaining a temperature around forty degrees Celsius—place it under a microscope, and observe. You will discover before your eyes the magnified images of innumerable single-celled organisms floating about. You will be able to survey spread out before you, as if laid plain to view, the great multitude of primordial cells destined to become the shared ancestor of all future life. Moreover, these primordial cells were the very last and most highly complex of the various compounds formed one after another as the Earth’s surface—amidst the cataclysmic upheavals you see before you—gradually cooled bit by bit. ...organic entities of exquisite refinement—compounded to most perfectly and nimbly manifest the vitality of all elements—were none other than Earth’s first congregation of life, worthy to be called the orthodox lineage of Ame-no-Minakanushi, Jehovah’s beloved child, Horus prince of the sun god.

Therefore, each and every one of these primordial cells possessed infinite spiritual capacities—able to manifest all manner of consciousnesses, emotions, judgmental faculties and more in response to environmental changes. They assimilated inorganic and organic matter beyond themselves to grow and split while simultaneously possessing even the spiritual capacity to reflexively exchange sensations and consciousness with neighboring cells that had divided nearby. Behold the evidence... Before your very eyes, had not these primordial cells now begun vigorously splitting and multiplying—their forms and capabilities rapidly evolving? With that spiritual capacity had they not swiftly grown, split apart, combined together and reflexively interacted—becoming united in purpose to resonate and thrive—while striving to manifest their communistic spiritual capacities across Earth to the utmost limit? Thus having begun evolving into increasingly advanced and complex forms? And thus...

“Once they’ve evolved this far, they must be invincible under heaven.” “There can be no other evolved being surpassing yours truly.” And thus, these utterly self-conceited ones—complacent in their prime—passed down their exact forms to their descendants as sponges, shellfish, fish, birds, and beasts... How about that! Before you knew it, they had unfolded before your very eyes the entire complex and diverse biosphere of today, teeming with endless transformations and every conceivable variety.

...Now behold. Among these myriad animals of such astonishing diversity, those with extremely low evolutionary development—creatures at or below the level of jellyfish—do not possess sophisticated things like brain matter or nerve granules, as you can plainly see. As they did in ancient times, through reflexive interaction between all their cells, they lived while mutually aware of all sensations throughout their entire bodies simultaneously—thinking, moving, eating, and sleeping. However, when animals evolved into highly complex forms as we had observed—as you well know—the content of consciousness grew increasingly intricate. The intervals between cells gradually widened until organisms became so large that one might wiggle a toe in a bathtub while wondering, "Is that distant part truly my body?" Thus, just as limbs and facial features specialized through division of labor, we created an automated multiplex reflex exchange center called "brain matter"—mediating sensations and consciousness across thirty trillion cells freely and unrestrictedly—until the entire body collectively throbbed with the realization: "I am me... This is how I live..."

The thirty trillion cells of our entire bodies—from the circulating red and white blood cells to the hardest bones and the very tips of our hair—each and every one of them simultaneously feels and mutually shares the exact same content of consciousness that we perceive, in precisely the same conscious form.

You can’t see things with eyeballs alone. You can’t hear sounds with ears alone. Behind these must lie the judgment and sensation of every cell in your body.

Similarly, brain matter cannot think or feel with brain matter alone. Behind this, there must surely exist the mutual subjective and objective interactions of all the body’s cells. Otherwise, human brain matter would become as meaningless as a moving picture machine that has lost both its silver screen and audience. Moreover, the astonishing agility of the reflexive interaction mediated by that brain matter—through which the entire body’s consciousness is relayed—is truly something to marvel at. Human social organizations connected by mere telegraphs, telephones, or radios could never hope to keep pace... A chill runs down your spine while your entire body erupts in goosebumps... You leap up with a start at the faintest prick to your rear... Such is the supreme rapidity and agility it achieves.

The thirty trillion cells forming every organ of our entire bodies—each taking on their own specialized tasks in this manner—used the reflexive interaction function of brain matter to simultaneously and directly see, hear, smell, and taste things. Centered on brain matter, they simultaneously became conscious, exulted, struggled, sang, danced, shrieked, and screamed. ……When you’re happy, your appetite increases. It’s because the stomach was also actively working. ……When you ate a meal, you regained energy before it was even digested. It’s because all the cells in the body became satiated simultaneously.

Therefore, it should now be understood beyond dispute that the true nature of what we perceive as our own life or spirit is merely peering through a transparency—the perfectly rounded overlap mediated by brain matter’s reflexive interaction of the subjective-objective realities depicted by each and every one of the countless cells throughout our bodies. Simultaneously, the fact would be nodded to without resistance—that the supposedly grand substance of brain matter, which we had been superstitiously made to revere until today, was in truth a delusion: we had mistaken the infinite spiritual knowledge and capacities contained within each and every cell of our entire bodies—reflexively interacting there—for its greatness… just as one might think a telephone exchange governs a metropolis.

Why, gentlemen... Isn’t it simple and clear? ...Is one not left utterly dumbstruck?

...Does not the fundamental problem of life consciousness—which modern scientists regard as the greatest and most supreme mystery, a marvel beyond compare—melt away without the slightest difficulty when one reverses and reconsiders the premise that "brain matter thinks"? Doesn't the role that brain matter undertakes become just as clear as those of the limbs?

If you still don't grasp this even now, gentlemen—come here again! Behold the interior of this Anpontan Pokan-style automatic reflex exchange bureau lying at Pokan's feet—this entity we call "brain matter." Witness these switchboard operators—exquisitely kind and sharp-witted—crammed within the exchange bureau... Study the nerve cells' mode of labor...

They—the great assembly of nerve cells—transformed themselves into wires, switches, cords, switchboards, relay stations, antennas, vacuum tubes, dials, coils, and more before your very eyes. Simultaneously, they divided into every conceivable specialized role corresponding to each type of conscious sensation contained within every cell of the body: crying managers, laughing managers, seeing managers, hearing managers, memory managers, infatuation managers, and so on. In this manner—detached from worldly concerns, ceaselessly day and night—they reflexively interacted the sentiments of thirty trillion citizens throughout every corner of the entire body.

…Gentlemen, you must not address them.

They were the specialized technicians of reflexive interaction selected from among the body’s cellular masses. Therefore, just like their counterparts in ordinary exchange bureaus, they continued to be summoned, summoning others, switching, and reconnecting lines without a single moment’s rest—all while remaining utterly unaware of what sort of reflexive interactions they were performing… or anything of the sort. …Whether the cabinet changed or war broke out, whether a great earthquake struck or a massive fire erupted; whether it was sweltering or freezing, a bee stung their head or flames licked at their rear—they had not a moment to spare for such concerns. For they were nothing more than Anpontan Pokan-style batteries, cords, interaction boards, coils, dials, vacuum tubes, and so on that reflexively interacted such consciousness, judgment, and sensations throughout the entire body…

Therefore, you mustn’t speak to them. You mustn’t let them think. You mustn’t make them handle tasks beyond their duties and doubly exhaust them. And so—the less they think of other matters... the more single-mindedly they devote themselves to simple reflexive interaction—the more the body’s reflexive interaction function attains agility and swiftness. The brain doesn’t tire. The flickering stops. The brain grows clear... seeks... and achieves lucidity.

How simple and clear this is! Doesn't the brain become Anpontan Pokan?

I... Anpontan Pokan, Director of the Bureau, can hereby declare with clarity. Having doffed your hats to this simple and lucid Anpontan Pokan-style reflexive interaction system of the Brain Matter Bureau—with your minds now clear-headed and consciousness crystal-clear—you Anpontan gentlemen shall never again be ensnared by the brain's tricks. You shall not think with brain matter...... And having become great doctors who lead the vanguard of state-of-the-art brain matter science—capable at once of Anpontan Pokanizing every unfathomable phenomenon related to brain matter—while I... this Anpontan Pokan who has so precisely investigated and exposed the true nature of that great demon "Brain Matter" controlling the very lifeblood of human culture... you cannot help but doff your hats once more to this celebrated brain matter prowess of mine—the very Anpontan Pokan who speaks thus—......that......

However, among you gentlemen, there may still be those who have not doffed their hats. There may yet be learned scholars puzzling over the various bizarre and inexplicable phenomena related to psychiatry or the spiritual realm that this account alone remains insufficient to explain.

...Splendid... Most splendid. Such people are precisely those worthy to join in discoursing on the bizarre. The true nature of this earth's greatest grotesque mystery—the brain matter that reigns as protagonist of all Ero, Gro, and Nonsense—must be thoroughly Anpontan Pokanized by none other than the newest, most advanced, highest-grade vanguard of humanity.

...Splendid... Most splendid. Though regrettable, such people must put their hats back on and return to the main entrance of the Brain Matter Bureau. "And there it is—right here! Read what's posted: the 'Brain Matter Bureau, Pokan-style Reflexive Interaction Affairs Membership Regulations'." Now then, gentlemen... As you see, these regulations contain a mere three clauses. They don't amount to one-tenth of an ordinary telephone exchange bureau's membership terms. They are remarkably simple and straightforward. Moreover, these three clauses represent ancestral unwritten laws that the thirty trillion cells of the human body follow with absurd extremism. Yet grasp these simple clauses, and you gentlemen shall become splendid, fully-fledged, undeniable grand doctors of brain matter science. You'll penetrate—without resistance—how utterly trivial are the backstage mechanisms behind all brain matter-related mysteries: those incomprehensible dramas, ironic farces, abusive insults, nonsensical plays, and terror spectacles currently performed across Earth's entire surface.

◇ First Clause: All reports reflexively interacting from the Brain Matter Bureau shall be believed and remembered as facts, even if they are not factual.

…Those who dreamt of thieves breaking in and shouted to rouse their entire households were none other than those governed by this First Clause. ◇ Second Clause: Any matter not reflexively interacting from the Brain Matter Bureau shall not be recognized as fact—even if performed by oneself—nor shall it remain in memory. “…Those who stubbornly insist ‘I’ve no recollection of stealing your futon last night’ were undoubtedly honest souls rigorously observing this Second Clause.”

Now, these two clauses on the right were the regulations inducing the 'somnolent state'—currently marked with double circles as a critical question in psychiatric academia. Of course, such phenomena commonly occurred even among ordinary-minded people, and their phrasing was concise enough to be easily remembered; but when it came to the Third Clause—as you could see—the wording appeared somewhat convoluted. However, its meaning remained just as exceedingly clear as the preceding two clauses. In other words... "In cases where abnormalities arise in the brain matter’s reflexive interaction functions, activate the reflexive interaction of all cells throughout the body except the brain matter in its place, just as in lower animals without brain matter."

In essence, this regulation—which one might call an emergency measure for cerebral crises—was precisely what had been perversely exploited. For that “thinking brain matter” of his had staged all manner of supernatural or inexplicable phenomena—ghosts, specters, hallucinations, mental aberrations, hysterical weeping, hysterical laughter, somnambulism, delirium—and through these acts had manipulated scientists’ very brain matter worldwide to its utter depths. The monstrous mechanism behind these illusions proved none other than the inverse application of this simple Third Clause Regulation itself.

It states: ◇ Third Clause: In the event of a malfunction arising in the Brain Matter Bureau's reflexive interaction function, a certain consciousness that had been undergoing reflexive interaction at the single location where said malfunction occurred shall sever connection with other consciousnesses. Each cell throughout the body shall directly utilize the reflexive interaction function it had possessed since primordial times—in a state equivalent to that of primitive lower animals (unrelated to the brain matter's reflexive interaction)—thereby sensing, judging, considering, or governing and activating movement throughout the entire body in precedence over other consciousnesses.

【Supplementary Provisions】 (i) In urgent situations where the Brain Matter Bureau lacks time to perform reflexive interaction… e.g., instances such as unconsciously closing one’s eyes or leaping back. (ii) When anesthetized… e.g., instances where the entire brain matter’s reflexive interaction function has been halted via anesthetic agents, resulting in unconscious behaviors and speech conducted through the sensations, conscious memories, etc., of cells throughout the body. (iii) When brain matter is in an abnormally deep sleep... e.g., somnambulism, sleep-talking, teeth-grinding, etc. The above three types of cases shall also follow this.

Before you forget, I implore you to record this in a notebook or similar receptacle. I especially urge this upon you students. This Third Clause forms the beginning and end of cerebral hygiene—what you might call your chronic neurasthenia is naught but an illness birthed from these very statutes... Nay... For most among mankind’s self-styled cultured races now find themselves entangled in this Third Clause’s provisions, spiraling into conditions of psychic bankruptcy and ruination...

And this was for no other reason than... As you might have surmised from what had been explained thus far, not only was the Brain Matter Bureau’s Pokan-style Reflexive Interaction Machine structurally exquisitely delicate—rendering it prone to multifarious malfunctions—but the replacement of its faulty components could not be hastily performed. Therefore, such emergency measures had been established out of necessity. Moreover, was it not delightful that the very existence of this Third Clause—the emergency regulation for reflexive interaction within the Brain Matter Bureau—provided the most potent, crystalline evidence to lay bare the mechanisms behind all bizarre phenomena conjured by brain matter upon this earth? For the prime specimen most fitting for this revelation was none other than the “hysterical weeping” and “hysterical laughter” I had just invoked!

In other words, when a certain location in the brain matter—for instance, the sympathetic platform responsible for laughter—became paralyzed due to cerebral hemorrhage, rendering reflexive interaction impossible, only the “current of laughter” that had been undergoing reflexive interaction there became dissociated from other consciousnesses in accordance with the Third Clause Regulation, drifting free. And while preemptively utilizing the reflexive interaction function inherited by all cells throughout the body since primordial times—function existing independently of brain matter—it compelled reckless, indiscriminate laughter at absolutely anything and everything. Even if currents of “anger” or “sadness” began to stir, while those currents detoured through the central reflexive interaction platform, the liberated “current of laughter” raced directly through cells across the entire body—scattering laughter ever onward—leaving no gap for other emotions to manifest outwardly. This was what was colloquially called “hysterical laughter,” and whether it be “hysterical anger” or “hysterical weeping,” they all arose from the same principle.

Needless to say, since this malfunction stemmed from cerebral hemorrhage, it would have become immediately apparent upon performing a pathological autopsy and removing the skull's lid..."Ah! Here lies the interaction point for laughter's current!"...While this fact stood glaringly evident, the truth remained that brain matter malfunctions visible to the naked eye in such manner leaned closer to exceptions. Beyond these, what countless varieties of bizarre phenomena might be staged by invisible cerebral malfunctions defied comprehension. They ceaselessly swarmed and meandered day and night—intermingling the monstrous extremities of so-called Ero, Gro, and Nonsense—from scientific civilization's attic to its basement...from head culture's tram-lined avenues into its labyrinthine back alleys. ...What proved more fascinating still was how each singular instance of those bizarre phenomena themselves—precisely as manifested—clearly evidenced delicate brain matter malfunctions imperceptible to stethoscopes and undetectable by X-rays.

First and foremost, what I found most intolerable was how you gentlemen of the modern so-called "thinking brain" remained utterly oblivious in your wildest dreams to the fact that this Third Clause emergency regulation existed between your brain matter itself and your body's cells. [...] Hence why you all without exception possessed the habit of clutching your heads or tilting your necks while spouting nonsense like "Using your brain won't deplete it like salmon roe!"—forcing your brain matter to think against its nature. [...] You made not the slightest recognition that the brain wasn't some organ for thinking—that it was merely the Anpontan Pokan Bureau specialized in simple reflexive interaction—yet you strove to make it ponder everything under the sun as if it were some official thinking ministry. [...] It was no different from nonchalantly burdening a telephone exchange bureau with municipal governance!

Just imagine how excessively overburdened the Brain Matter Bureau’s switchboard operators must be… How many drastic reflexive interaction errors must be occurring… Whirling maelstroms of hallucinations, illusions, and perverse notions beyond all imagination. Proof over theory… The facts lie before your eyes. If you think too much with the brain matter—like a coil overcharged with current—the entire cerebral tissue grows heated, and its reflexive interaction function begins to falter. When this occurs, the myriad consciousnesses within your body’s cells lose mutual connection and commence taking arbitrary independent actions. This becomes a light, semi-conscious somnambulism of consciousness—racing boundlessly through the spatial awareness forged by every cell in your body. ...These very ceaseless fantasies and delusions you gentlemen vacantly fixate upon when mentally exhausted—as your brain matter grows wearier and lapses into slumber—see even those tenuous inter-consciousness connections grow increasingly fragmented. And this progression into incoherent dreaming mirrors what you must vividly experience when dozing over novels or nodding off in classrooms and trains.

People of old were deeply superstitious; when walking through darkness, they would exhaust their brain matter through fear and fall into hallucinations and perverse notions. These visions and sensations have been passed down as tales of ghosts and specters—yet pitifully, those who mock such facts cannot claim possession of modern-style sophisticated nerves. They remain excluded from the company of gentlemen and ladies who tote about neurasthenia, hysteria, restrictive medications, and sleeping pills.

Even among you modern gentlemen, those engaged in particularly hectic urban lives exhaust your brain matter's functions even at high noon, causing various consciousness operations and senses of judgment to dissociate—crawling through the reflexive interaction functions of nerve endings...cells throughout the body—until they verge on a drifting, flickering somnambulistic state...Thus when passing by a large smokestack, you feel it might topple onto your head any moment and instinctively quicken your pace...When asleep, you fancy the sound of passing trains rushing toward your pillow and impulsively reach to switch on the lamp. In addition to these—stoves yawning, egg yolks glaring up from their dishes, red postboxes shifting positions overnight at street corners, bread ovens sighing at midnight, portraits sweating, white hands emerging from desk drawers beckoning "Come here," pistols turning toward you to go "Bang!"—such strange phenomena ceaselessly arising amidst scientific culture all stem from errors in reflexive interaction operations due to brain matter fatigue...none other than a somnambulism of consciousness.

Now as I have previously stated, mental abnormalities of this degree are commonplace among you gentlemen. Moreover, such people are dimly aware of their own mental abnormalities themselves; thus, carelessly treating them as mad risks exacerbating their symptoms—which is precisely why they’re deliberately excluded from official psychiatric patient counts. Yet once they progress one step further, they become utterly impossible to leave unattended. They descend into gilded madness, qualifying for escorted residence in red-brick apartments.

I—this Anpontan Pokan—had been under the care of Kyushu Imperial University’s psychiatry department to this day, and let me tell you, such folks used to swarm there in droves. Moreover, when they dragged out those folks one after another to the lectern and you listened to the lectures that Dr.Masaki the Madman—the department head—gave to the students, it proved downright amusing how he spouted exactly what I—this Anpontan Pokan—had been thinking. “Ahem… As I have just explained, the human brain matter functions akin to a compound spherical reflector that reflexively interacts—without omitting a single detail—with the contents of consciousness within all cells throughout the body, thereby forming a focal point. The state of human brain matter simultaneously illuminating the myriad phenomena of conscious sensation coursing through each of the thirty trillion cells mirrors how a dragonfly’s compound eyes survey the entirety of the great universe in all directions with a single glance. ...Now, this psyche reflexively interacted upon moment by moment by that person’s brain matter—this focal point—is none other than what lies equally within every cell throughout their body: their so-called individuality or characteristics. According to my experiments, these are without exception accumulations of psychological operations hereditarily transmitted through generations… What we call ‘ordinary people’ are those in whom infinite psychological habitualities experienced by ancestors manifest unified through cerebral reflexive interaction, maintaining mutual harmony while forming a focal point. Yet… human psychological operations each bear distinct quirks per individual, and when ancestors bequeath these uncorrected idiosyncrasies to descendants across generations, they grow increasingly aberrant over time. For instance, consider a woman who inherits a predisposition to fixate unrelentingly on a single matter and becomes infatuated with a man by chance… Should she persist in ceaselessly thinking solely of meeting him awake or asleep, seeing him… being with him—the portion of her brain matter reflexively interacting with this ‘longing consciousness’ would ultimately exhaust itself and cease functioning. Thereafter, that longing consciousness gradually dissociates from reflexive interaction, solidifies into fantasy and delusion, and initiates an obsessive serpentine somnambulism. Night and day would find her depicting her beloved’s form midair and babbling of naught else. When this occurred, the girl at the longing-affiliated interaction platform grew increasingly unable to cope until she collapsed in exhaustion. The longing consciousness—now wholly liberated—whirled into frenzied activity. The madness deepened further… They dashed into streets… Only to be restrained. They shook iron bars in frenzy… or were labeled with some mania, choreographed beneath floral canopies to receive public acclamation even a century hence… Such became their progression.

Of course, this represents the standard progression through which ordinary people succumb to madness—it being merely that those possessing the faintest traces of such tendencies are deemed ordinary folk, while those harboring them abundantly get branded as so-called psychiatric lineage. Therefore, invention maniacs, research maniacs, collection maniacs, and all others labeled as such—whether termed [such-and-such] maniacs or so-called lunatics—differing only in degree, all indisputably belong to this illustrious fellowship. While timely intervention might occasionally redeem them, once these cases escalate further into full-blown somnambulism, the condition’s character transforms entirely. Undoubtedly, it constitutes a form of mental illness whose manifestations surpass even ordinary lunacy in extravagance—yet the individual themselves remains indistinguishable from any normal person. Nay—rather, it proves a curious malady frequently found among specially crafted paragons of virtue: those mildly befuddled by nasal ailments; those with exquisitely refined intellects overqualified for scholarship; those too gentle-hearted to harm even an insect. A designation like “lunatic” could never adhere to them. Yet when midnight strikes, these very individuals abruptly rise to commit antics more absurd and cruelties more atrocious than any madman’s—rendering the phenomenon ever more grotesque and perversely enthralling.

That is to say, while awake, their state of consciousness remains not the least bit different from that of an ordinary person. The consciousness permeating all cells throughout their body becomes uniformly unified and harmonized through brain matter's reflexive interaction—but when night deepens and that person's brain matter enters complete suspended animation through deep sleep, this state of slumber diverges from ordinary human rest... Surpassing normal thresholds of unconsciousness and approaching death's domain itself—plunging into what might be termed a corpse-like condition where neither vigorous shaking nor shouted commands could rouse them... This constitutes the defining characteristic of somnambulism patients.

Now, when sleep deepened in such fashion, it naturally followed that within the consciousness permeating every cell of the body, one or two entities incapable of descending into equally profound slumber would emerge. Moreover, this belatedly wakeful consciousness—much like how foreground elements glow brighter against darkening backdrops—awakened ever more vividly as sleep deepened, commencing sundry activities. Consider someone who drifted into sleep while maintaining a single emotion or volition at fever pitch—be it “I must possess that diamond!” or “I shall slaughter that detestable wretch!”—their eyes clenched shut in frenzied agitation. When their brain matter eventually plunged into slumber’s abyssal depths, among the cells sharing this cerebral dormancy, only that singular consciousness remained wakeful—a lone straggler in sleep’s march. Thus divorced from conscience, common sense, and reason, this lopsided consciousness would rise—harnessing the reflexive interactions inherent to bodily cells as substitute for brain matter’s governance. Arbitrarily summoning judgments and sensations from cellular multitudes as needed, it would perceive, cogitate, and execute its designs unimpeded. Diamonds were purloined; loathsome adversaries dispatched—yet no memory of these deeds lingered, having bypassed cerebral registration entirely. Upon waking, such individuals reverted wholly to their Anpontan Pokan-esque beings—utterly unperturbed and indistinguishable from their waking selves. Confronted with pilfered gems or victims’ corpses, their ignorance remained impregnable, thereby completing their metamorphosis into pure Anpontan Pokan manifestations.

Conversely, during such somnambulism, since all cells throughout the body were actively performing both the role of the Brain Matter and their own specialized roles simultaneously, it had become customary for one to perceive a peculiar fatigue upon awakening. This principle could be readily acknowledged when observing its complete equivalence to cases where only the Brain Matter was anesthetized using drugs; however, since post-anesthetic fatigue and post-somnambulistic fatigue were such entirely identical types of exhaustion that they proved exceedingly difficult to distinguish, they occasionally presented a most intriguing forensic research problem.

As the most fitting specimen exemplifying this, there currently stood this young man who was intently listening to my lecture. This young man might have been someone you gentlemen recognized among yourselves. While withholding his address and full name as per custom—this past spring when he had just turned twenty years old—he took this university’s entrance examination and passed with top-tier grades only to tragically succumb shortly thereafter to an attack of hereditary somnambulism inherited from his ancestors, strangling his own bride on their wedding eve. Moreover—not content with that—having previously suffered the same attack at sixteen years old when he strangled his own biological mother (making him a rare prodigy even in this field)—after coming to this classroom and undergoing my unique liberation therapy, he appeared to gradually regain his sanity; lately taking to scratching his hair and thumping his temples with a fist while declaring “This must be how this thing malfunctions—no doubt! No doubt!” At times he would stop mid-room and launch into brain matter lectures—but since these speeches parroted my own classroom teachings from first word to last verbatim—it proved most gratifying; so much so that even I occasionally attended for reference. The memory capacity of this human variety so remarkably transcends imagination… For having been severed from all past memories by violent somnambulistic attacks—his current-event recall floats and plays in an absolute world of freedom unhindered. Thus once focusing his attention—he could memorize minutiae with superhuman precision. “Yet ordinarily he maintains this startled expression like some creature freshly hatched from an egg—hence why we’ve provisionally bestowed upon him the distinguished title of Dr.Anpontan Pokan…”

When Professor Masaki reached this point in his lecture, the students would all turn this way at once and roar with laughter. And so I fled the mental hospital right then and there in a daze. And so here and now, standing at this crossroads and observing the aberrant condition of your brain matter, I could no longer abandon my duty—thus I have issued this warning. I have resolutely published the Pokan-style Brain Matter Theory that transcends time and space.

...How impressed you gentlemen must have been! “Did you see?” “Did you hear?” “Were you surprised?” “The moment I, Anpontan Pokan, proclaimed, ‘The brain matter is not the seat of thought,’ did not the trees shed their verdure and the flowers relinquish their crimson?” “Has not all materialist culture been uprooted from its very foundations, and has not every branch of psychiatry crumbled into mere theoretical phantoms?” ...I repeat. Humanity denied God through the brain matter that thinks. It rebelled against nature and forged a materialist culture. It spurned human sentiments and morals born of natural psychology, superstitiously adhering to individualistic materialist creeds. And day by day, it rendered that materialist culture null—stripped of center, reduced to beasts, driven to self-defilement, afflicted with neurasthenia, plunged into madness, and delivered unto suicide.

All of this was the mischief of the “Brain Matter That Thinks.” All of this was the poisonous influence of the materialist cult superstitiously adhering to the “Ghost of Brain Matter.”

However, the time had now come to dispel this superstition. Humanity—having denied its superstitions toward gods—now found itself driven to the brink where it must deny the “brain matter that thinks.” The glorious season had arrived when we must return from materialist science’s artifice to idealist science’s natural order. “Thus! As this slogan’s inaugural enactment—I, Anpontan Pokan—have hereby demonstrated by dashing my own ‘brain matter that thinks’ upon the earth!”

"And thus, I crush it in this very manner." “Hngh... Uuun...” ×　　　　　　　　　　×　　　　　　　　　　×

...and... "AHAHAHAHA...WELL? WERE YOU SURPRISED?...DID YOU SEE?" "DID YOU HEAR?" "WERE YOU IMPRESSED?"

“This is what I call the factual novel of the Absolute Scientific Detective!” This was a progress report detailing how Dr. Anpontan Pokan—the ultra-cerebral youth detective—had chased his own brain matter, flawlessly apprehended it, smashed it into the ground, and delivered its final rites. “It’s the decomposition formula of a higher-order equation from the world’s supreme scientific romance ‘Brain Matter—Brain Matter’!”

"So if you have a mind that truly understands the appeal of this novel's tricks... Look... Didn't I lend it to you the other day? You'll come to understand the terrifying true nature of that paper titled 'Fetal Dreams.' You'll comprehend the principles governing the tremendous nightmare seen by fetuses within their mothers' wombs. The contents of liberation therapy experimenting with those monstrous principles, the true identity of Dr. Anpontan Pokan confined there, and his shudder-inducing history—all will become as clear as if held in your hand."

“Moreover—as an additional bonus amusement—once you grasp how pursuing the conventional notion that ‘Brain Matter thinks’ within Brain Matter itself gives birth to the conclusion that ‘Brain Matter is not the seat of thought’... and once you take this ‘not the seat of thought’ and pound it upward once more, only to have the ultimate conclusion circle back again to the original ‘seat of thought’... thereby comprehending even my unique mental science principle of bizarre circularity reaching the pinnacle of mystification... then I bid you kindly offer your applause for this spectacle!”

...What the... My eyes are getting dizzy... Ah... Ahahahaha... That’s dazzling, isn’t it? Once they hear my bluster, most fools end up reeling and swaying... Wh... what’s this? That’s not it. Could it be I’m drunk on a cigar?…

“Ahahahaha... This is a riot!”

“Wahahahahahahaha!”

(Responsibility for the text lies with the author.)

*Fetal Dreams*

――The human fetus is made to represent the entirety of embryos of other animals and plants. ―Religious, scientific, artistic, and other verifications; citations of examples; and annotations and explanations concerning documents―all of which should span infinite and vast domains―are to be omitted or kept to an utmost minimum. The human fetus sees a single dream during the ten months it resides within its mother’s womb.

That dream—which could be titled *The Live Footage of Universal Evolution*, where the fetus itself takes the leading role and directs—was akin to a terrifyingly lengthy continuous film spanning hundreds of millions, or even tens of billions, of years. To elaborate: this film began with the living conditions of the primordial single-celled microorganism that became the fetus’s most ancient ancestor. It then followed this protagonist cell as it gradually evolved into human form—that is, into the fetus itself—depicting with the fetus’s own immediate, present subjectivity all the unimaginably prolonged eons during which it had been tormented by heart-stopping terrors, eye-widening cataclysms, natural selection, survival struggles, and the suffocating calamities, persecutions, agonies, and hardships endured. This constituted a magnificent, phantasmagoric film beyond imagination. [...] Within it were projected with visceral realism—needless to say—the indescribable spectacles of prehistoric monstrosities now turned to fossils, and of the cataclysms that had slaughtered and annihilated such flora and fauna. Furthermore, this great nightmare—which had to reach extremes of horror and dread by depicting even the innumerable sins committed by generations of ancestors, from primitive humans who survived and evolved amidst those cataclysms down to the fetus’s immediate parents, all driven by their desperate struggles for survival and multifarious desires—was directly and indirectly proven through resolving the two great inexplicable phenomena concerning “embryology” and “dreams” as described hereafter.

First and foremost, when a human fetus is conceived within the mother’s womb, the very first form it exhibits is, like the primordial animal that is the common ancestor of all living beings, a single perfectly round cell.

That single perfectly round cell, once conceived in the mother’s womb, soon divided and proliferated into two cells—left and right. And thus, adhering closely together as they were, they still formed a single living organism.

The two left and right cells soon each split and proliferate into two upper and lower cells. And again, all four cells adhere closely together, absorbing nutrients from the mother’s womb while functioning as a single organism.

In this manner—splitting into four, eight, sixteen, thirty-two, sixty-four... and eventually countless cells—they multiplied exponentially while adhering together, gradually growing larger as they unfailingly repeated within the womb the ancestral forms of evolution from humanity’s earliest single-celled microbial ancestor to modern humans, precisely following the order of their evolutionary progression. First, it took the form of a fish. Next, it changed the front and rear fins of that fish into four legs and took on the form of an amphibian that crawled about.

Next, it strengthens those four legs and takes on the form of a beast that runs about.

And finally, after retracting its tail, lifting its front legs into the shape of hands, and evolving into the human form—the ordinary appearance of a fetus—it is born with a cry... Thus, following this sequence, it has become customary that the time required for this process shows almost no variation among all people. This is, in embryology, an already thoroughly understood fact—a phenomenon that no one can deny. But then, why do all fetuses repeat such a laborious embryological sequence within the womb? Why do they not immediately take on a small human form, grow as they are, and be born? Or why does the initial single cell unfailingly repeat the exact same embryological sequence as if all people had unanimously agreed upon it? That is to say...

"What makes the fetus do this?"

When it comes to this problem, there exists not a single person who can provide an appropriate interpretation. Even if one were to search through every corner of modern scientific documents, this interpretation alone would not be discovered. It has come to be regarded as something that can only be described as a mystery, with no other way to explain it. Next, all fetuses unfailingly repeat within the mother’s womb, in perfect order without the slightest error, the forms through which their ancestors evolved; however, as the duration of this process is greatly abbreviated, there are even instances where the forms of each successive era—through which humanity’s ancestral animals gradually evolved fins into limbs, scales into hair… over millions or tens of millions of years—are repeated and passed through in mere minutes or seconds.

This could already be counted as an unexplained mystery; however, what rendered it still more mystifying was that the ratio between this condensed time and that actually required for evolution did not appear random in the slightest. That is to say, while human fetuses were understood to repeat their ancestral evolutionary course since primordial times over roughly ten months, other animals generally exhibited shorter gestation periods in inverse proportion to their evolutionary complexity—so that those of the lowest evolutionary degree, namely bacteria and other single-celled organisms retaining their primordial form, largely had no gestation period whatsoever. They simply split into two new organisms while maintaining their original form... This stood as an empirical fact, yet what conceivable reason could account for it? Why did the human fetus—the pinnacle of evolutionary complexity—demand the longest gestation period? In other words,

"What compels the fetus to act thus?"

When attempting to apply an appropriate interpretation to this problem, it was discovered that doing so proved absolutely impossible with modern scientific knowledge. It had come to be regarded as something that could only be described as a mystery, with no other way to explain it.

The above were concrete examples of inexplicable phenomena concerning the fetus; next, when one researched and observed the human “body” thus formed from an anatomical perspective, countless similar inexplicable phenomena emerged once more. In other words, when one observed the human body from its surface—precisely because its degree of evolution was high... or rather, precisely because such meticulous care had been invested in its gestation—it could be readily acknowledged that it had been constructed with far greater nobility and elegance than other animals. From its gentle yet dignified facial features to its beautiful skin and aesthetically balanced skeletal structure and musculature, the human form appeared every bit the supreme being of all creation. Yet once one stripped away this body's epidermal layer, separated the flesh, examined the internal organs, and meticulously dissected the brain matter and sensory apparatus for observation, it became evident that every individual component of its structure constituted an inheritance—handed down through our ancestral lineage from lower animals evolved over eons: fish, reptiles, apes, and others—of their living organs. In other words, even in the shape of a single tooth or the structure of a single strand of hair, the history of natural selection’s immense persecution—or rather, the hardships of survival struggles spanning astonishingly long years that had refined and evolved them to such an extent—was vividly recorded. Thus, the great and profound memory function of a certain force—which meticulously commemorated each detail of that history and accordingly repeated and evolved the fetus’s form until it was perfected into human shape—was clearly etched into every corner of completed human cells.

Needless to say, since such phenomena have been clearly demonstrated by evolutionary theory, genetics, anatomy, and other fields, I will refrain from providing detailed explanations here. However, the question remains: what entity has remembered and caused this history to repeat itself?

"What makes the fetus do this?" Regarding this matter, not a single explanation had yet been provided. It remained nothing more than a single mystery—there was simply no other way to explain it.

Moreover, that was not all. When we delved one step further and observed the substance of what constituted the human spirit, such facts came to be proven all the more profoundly. That is to say, when observed from the surface, the human spirit too exhibited a beauty of such differing magnitude that it defied comparison with other animals. Humans cloaked the substance of their spiritual lives beneath what might be termed a single "skin of humanity"—a self-awareness proclaiming "humans are the supreme beings of all creation," or what could be named "cultural pride." They applied cosmetics labeled common sense or personality, maintaining an air of detached composure. Yet once this epidermis—this so-called human skin—was peeled away, what emerged beneath proved nothing but the fact that vigilance against immense persecution—the astonishingly prolonged natural selection and survival struggles through which their distant microbial ancestors had been forged into modern humans—had been inherited exactly as it was, perfectly preserved in the psychological forms of animals from successive epochs. This truth was laid bare with brutal clarity.

First, when one peels away the epidermis of so-called cultured people—that single layer of human skin decorated with benevolence, mercy, justice, humanity, etiquette, and such—the life psychology of barbarians or primitive humans emerges from beneath. Those who most clearly demonstrate this fact are innocent children. Children who have yet to learn how to don the cultural veneer exhibit everywhere the same character as ancient peoples equally unversed in such veiling—thus when they pick up a stick and feel compelled to play at war, this stems from the heredity of so-called warlike primitive human traits that persisted through survival struggles waged in conflicts between tribes and ethnic groups. That is to say, it is the instinctual memories from barbarian eras—latently transmitted within their cells—being stimulated and awakened by the suggestive resemblance of a stick to a weapon. When they find bugs and chase them around without any purpose, this is the psychological remnant from the hunting era—where anything moving was pursued—being stimulated and evoked by the suggestive presence of bugs; and when they gleefully tear off the limbs of captured bugs, pluck their wings, split their bellies, or roast them over fire, this is none other than a perfect reproduction of ancient peoples’ cruelty—memories of using such methods to dispose of prey and captives, toying with and humiliating them to thoroughly satisfy their sense of victory and superiority. Furthermore, the fact that babies cry when left in the dark is a revival of primitive humans’ fear—from an era without fire—of darkness teeming with wild beasts and venomous snakes, while their tendency to relieve themselves anywhere is a reenactment of ancient habits from a time when people slept among tree roots and grass; all of this has been explained by modern advances in psychological research.

Next, if one peeled away this barbarian or primitive human skin once more, they discovered that beneath it lay beastly nature—that is to say, the character of wild animals—overflowing entirely. For example, when same-sex individuals—male strangers or female strangers—met for the first time, they exchanged what appeared to be civilized greetings, but inwardly revealed a psychological state where their eyes narrowed suspiciously at each other as they furtively sniffed around one another. If one let their guard down, they directed attention even to the area around their opponent's rear, discovering unpleasant details from minute observations, thereby hinting at mutual urges to wrinkle their noses at each other or bare their teeth. If they grew careless, they started barking. Biting... it proved entirely identical to the psychology of dogs and cats encountered at a town’s crossroads. When they found someone weaker than themselves, they felt like tormenting them a bit. They thought of killing anyone who became a nuisance. If no one was around, they considered stealing. They contemplated sniffing another’s urine. We exhibited these expressions of bestial psychology—such as thinking "Should I bury my own waste...?"—everywhere in our daily lives. Thus, all psychological manifestations matching the insults anyone might utter, like "You beast!" or "You animal!", were none other than this very phenomenon.

Next, if one cut through yet another membrane beneath this bestial nature, this time the psychology of insects came swarming forth from below.

For example, they would push aside fellow creatures to climb higher. They crawled through unseen spaces seeking underhanded gains. Upon achieving some clever feat, they immediately sought refuge in holes of safety. Discovering nutrient-rich hosts, they stealthily approached to parasitize them. They assumed repulsive forms and behaviors heedless of surroundings to protect themselves. They concealed themselves within hardened shells to repel approaches. When sensing enemies, they sacrificed others to save themselves. In dire moments, they wielded poisonous stingers. They ejected ink. They sprayed urine and emitted vile odors. Or they disguised themselves as local vegetation or adopted the guises of stronger beings... All such base, cowardly human behaviors laid bare these insectile instincts, and the scornful terms of common parlance—sniveling weaklings, maggot-brains, rice-grubs, mewling larvae, blood-flukes, privy-worms, fart-beetles, centipede-fiends, wriggling mosquito spawn—served as nothing less than contemptuous labels for manifestations of psychology inherited from that age of insect existence.

Next... finally, if we dissect the core of this insect psychology—that is to say, the core of all animal psychology lying deepest within human instinct—the psychology of protozoa, shared with bacteria and other microorganisms, emerges. It manifests through modes of existence and movement that can only be perceived as living and moving about meaninglessly—often expressed through what is termed group psychology, trend psychology, or spectator psychology. When each of these ceaselessly moving actions is examined individually, they may appear utterly meaningless; yet when amassed in great numbers, they come to produce fearsome effects akin to those of various bacteria. They swarm toward whatever glitters, whatever seems impressive, whatever clamors loudly—toward anything logically simplistic, clearly stimulating—in short, toward anything novel and easily grasped, though naturally possessing neither discernment nor comprehension. Like microorganisms placed beneath a microscope, they proceed in an ecstatic trance—unselfconscious and visionless—drawn along by the multitude even as they themselves constitute that multitude. Herein lies meaningless exhilaration, pride, and security; yet ultimately, swept up in fervor without reason, they plunge headlong into discarding their lives without hesitation—riots... revolutions... presenting a spectacle indistinguishable from spermatozoa swarming toward a single drop of malic acid.

Human psychology, upon reaching this point, for the first time approached the laws of motion and change governing physics and chemical equations. That is to say, having drawn within a hair's breadth of inanimate matter, what politicians and others who traffic in popularity exploited was none other than this bacterial effluvium festering at humanity's core. Within such psychology, our human spiritual life took the simplest, basest elements as its nucleus, enveloping them outward through increasingly sophisticated animal psychologies before swaddling everything beneath that so-called "human skin"—decking this surface with ribbons labeled social graces, appearances, lineage, reputation, and personality, slathering on cosmetics and drenching itself in perfume to strut down society's thoroughfare. Yet when we dissected its substance, we discovered the greater part consisted precisely of ancestral animal psychological memories—latent within human cells—being reenacted exactly as described above. However, just as with the anatomical observations of the body discussed earlier, how had the fetus come to encapsulate such infinite multitudes of complex psychological memories within its cells' subconscious—or instinct?

"What compels the fetus to act thus?" Such matters remained wholly unexplained. No—even the fact that the content of a single human spirit itself constituted vestiges of universal evolution spanning hundreds of millions of years went entirely unremarked, shrouded by shallow vanities like "humans reign supreme over creation" or "I'm a proper specimen of mankind!" The preceding had catalogued these inexplicable phenomena concerning fetal gestation, the adult physique perfected through such development, and evolutionary relics manifesting in the human psyche; we now turn our observation to the mysterious phenomena of "dreams" witnessed by humankind.

Dreams have long been considered the quintessential symbol of mystery, so much so that upon encountering even the slightest unexpected event, one immediately wonders, "Is this a dream?" One moment presents all phenomena indistinguishable from reality; the next reveals unimaginably bizarre landscapes or chaotic jumbles of objects. Scenes initially governed by real-world psychological and physical laws suddenly transform endlessly according to preposterous principles foreign to myth or legend. Since ancient times, countless scholars have agonized over dreams' true nature and the laws governing their psychological and visual transformations. Here this text presents three crucial items among such dream characteristics—key clues for unraveling dreams' essence and true form.

(1) Events within dreams frequently exhibited extremely abrupt and inconsistent elements during their progression. No. In fact, such cases proved far more numerous—when faced with supernatural scenes or utterly irrational activities and transformations of objects, one found it quicker to consider them dreams. Yet not only did suspicion toward such supernatural irrationality scarcely arise while dreaming; the impressions received from these events remained consistently sincere and earnest—indeed, carrying a poignancy surpassing reality itself in its depth.

(2) Scenes never before seen or heard of, and unremarkable cataclysms manifest with the same sensation as reality. (3) That events appearing in dreams—even those perceived as continuous incidents spanning years or decades—are actually witnessed within a time measurable in mere minutes or seconds has been proven by modern science. The various inexplicable phenomena concerning "the fetus" and "dreams" enumerated above have become major scientific questions that no one can deny; yet why have these mysteries remained unsolved to this day? When we consider why the key to solving these mysteries has eluded everyone until today, we find there are two causes.

The first was that scholars' conventional understanding of human cells—which enable gestation and subsequently induce dreams in adults completed through that gestation—was entirely mistaken; the second was that humanity's fundamental conception of "time" flowing through this universe was fundamentally mistaken... these two factors.

In other words, the content of each individual cell composing the human body surpasses that of the single human who serves as its protagonist. No—they possess astoundingly great and complex content and capabilities comparable to the entire universe itself. Therefore, conventional materialist scientific approaches—peering at a single cell’s contents through a microscope from its exterior, chemically analyzing its components, studying its division and proliferation through changes in form and color—utterly fail to comprehend the true greatness of cellular content and capabilities. This demand proves as unreasonable as ignoring heroes’ and great figures’ lifetime achievements while attempting to ascertain their noble character solely through observing corpses’ exteriors and dissecting their interiors. ...The same applies to time...The time indicated by the Central Meteorological Observatory’s instruments, our clock hands, Earth’s rotations and revolutions—this constitutes no true time. It is artificial time arbitrarily manufactured by materialist science. Illusionary time. Sham time...True time cannot be measured by such constricting rulers or rigid metrics—it flows infinitely adaptable, an arcane mystery beyond comprehension. Should one truly grasp this fact, they must simultaneously acknowledge Fetal Dreams’ reality—as though clasping life’s enigma and cosmic riddles within their palm.

Originally, cells were minuscule particles—so small as to be one in tens of trillions within the human body—imperceptible even under low-powered microscopes. Therefore, the complexity of their contents and the extent of their expressible capabilities were presumed to amount to merely one ten-trillionth of humanity's total capacity... In any case, something utterly simple and powerless... Such had been the belief dominating most scientists' minds until then. Therefore, even though cells' mysterious capabilities—their life processes, reproduction, heredity—were discovered one after another, astonishing researchers, studies remained confined to what could be observed through microscopes and analyzed chemically... that is, to research explainable within materialist science's bounds. The prevailing view had not advanced one step beyond conceiving cells as mere one-in-tens-of-trillions components—simple and powerless entities. To conduct research beyond this was considered blasphemy against materialist science. It had even been regarded as committing scholarly sin.

However, this fundamental miscalculation arose from a profoundly irrational conjecture—one where scholars shackled by modern so-called materialist scientific reasoning estimated cells' content and capabilities based on their shape and size, arbitrarily concluding "They must amount to roughly this much," thereby allowing preconceived notions to dominate. The reason why great scientific mysteries such as life's enigma and dreams' unfathomable nature remain perpetually unresolved lies precisely in this fact that must be acknowledged here: researchers study cells constituting life's vast subject through methodologies shackled by materialistic constraints—methodologies epitomized by "peering at the ceiling through a reed’s pith"—or rather, through unscientific methods overly imprisoned by science itself. When one sweeps away antiquated academic superstitions toward constrained theories, adopting an unshackled perspective to observe universal phenomena while aligning this inquiry with clearer practical manifestations, we must recognize—through scientific truth transcending modernity—that a single cell contains substance far surpassing microscopic or chemical measurements; content so vast that even compared to the cosmos itself, no disparity can be discerned. Those who superstitiously deem materialist scientific methods as life's foundation must confront an undeniable fact regardless of denialist efforts.

The first that must be cited was cells' ability to construct humans—that single cell lodged in the maternal womb as life's seed had split and grown through the previously described sequence, developing while tracing its ancestors' evolutionary path generation after generation. There it had been thus; here it became this—recalling again and again these patterns, it constructed itself without deviation through fish, lizard, monkey, and human stages. Moreover, though indefinable in totality, this process strove to synthesize parental virtues into something marginally advanced—hence why all human ears, eyes, noses, and mouths share identical placement... "This is my child." It resembled everyone yet no one; mirrored him too. The tantrum-throwing matched Father's exactly; the quick learning mirrored mine... Thus they proceeded to align even microscopic details with exquisite precision—each cell's fearsome mnemonic capacity! What then of their mutual resonance's profundity—their judgment, reasoning, aspiration, conscience? When humanity—these cellular multitudes—encountered cosmic phenomena, comprehended them, resonated profoundly, then forged nations and societies to collectively shape culture... How fathomless that creative power! All such near-omniscient operations ultimately manifested but the primal cell's spiritual power made visible—modernity's boundless culture being naught else than this microscopic entity's latent capacity reflected across Earth's face.

◇ Note: A human being constitutes a vast assembly of cells possessing such magnificent content—their spiritual capacities unified into a single entity under a shared consciousness mediated by brain matter. Therefore, while the knowledge, emotions, and will manifested by humans ought to far surpass those of individual cells, reality proves precisely the opposite; since the world's dawn, every sage and great person—no matter their wisdom—has stood powerless before cells' supreme spiritual power... compelled to bow like stars before the sun. That is to say, the capabilities of this cellular collective unified into human form exhibit a bizarre phenomenon: they fail to equal even one ten-trillionth of a single cell's capacity—nay, not even one ten-trillionth of that. This is thought to stem from insufficient evolutionary development in brain matter—the unifying organ for cellular spiritual power throughout the human body—thereby obstructing cells' full spiritual expression. Simultaneously, might this primal impulse belong to that primordial single cell—life's inaugural seed—when it first emerged upon Earth? And that infinite spiritual power, having traversed manifold processes to materially manifest itself across Earth's surface, evolved into humanity as the most advantageous and capable form while progressing toward ever superior organisms. Thus we may conclude that such contradictions, inconveniences, and strange phenomena emerge precisely because contemporary humans remain unfinished beings within this transitional epoch. However, as this matter constitutes an exceptionally crucial research topic defying exhaustive explanation overnight, I shall here confine myself to its brief notation as reference.

Now that the relationship between the human body and spirit on one hand, and the spiritual power of cells on the other, had become so clear, elucidating the essence of what we call "dreams" had also become an exceedingly straightforward matter.

Every single cell is a life entity possessing consciousness and spiritual power equal to, or surpassing, that of our individual human lives. Therefore, as long as all cells are engaged in some form of work, modern medicine has proven that they absorb nutrients, develop, split, proliferate, fatigue, age, decompose, and ultimately vanish in the course of their labor. Moreover, each individual cell itself—while laboring, developing, splitting, proliferating, fatiguing, decomposing, and vanishing—is conscious of the suffering and pleasure inherent to its work to a degree equal to, nay surpassing, that of we individuals… Simultaneously, in response to such pleasure and suffering, these cells indulge in boundless associations, imaginations, and fantasies of bizarre and kaleidoscopic impressions equivalent to—or exceeding—what we individuals perceive. This is no different from how a single nation leaves behind countless artistic works over the course of its rise and fall.

That which most directly demonstrates this fact is none other than the dreams we experience. Fundamentally, what we call dreams occur when, while the entire human body sleeps, the spiritual power of certain cells within it awakens due to some stimulus and becomes actively engaged. The conscious state of these awakened cells themselves, being reflected in the brain matter, is what we name as "dreams" that remain in memory. For example, when a human falls asleep after swallowing undigested matter, during that time only the stomach cells awaken and labor on with groans... Ah, how painful. Unbearable. What on earth will become of this? Why must we alone suffer such cruel treatment?... As we seethe with endless grievances, the stomach cells' boundless agony and discontent coalesce into an association that is reflected in the brain matter. That is to say, it depicts the protagonist of this agony—innocent yet imprisoned, shackled with heavy chains, forced to carry stones beyond their strength while groaning and laboring... or being buried beneath a collapsed house by an irresistible earthquake, flailing about and screaming... until finally, when the arduous work of digestion eases, they feel a sense of "At last..." ...Then, the feelings within the dream... The content of associations and fantasies reflected in the brain matter also ease, transforming into scenes like revering the sunrise atop a mountain peak or the sensation of skiing down a magnificent slope in one exhilarating glide.

Or again, when one closed their eyes while thinking “I want to see her” on the verge of sleep, that single sensual stimulus alone lingered in slumber, and their unbearable longing to go to her—coupled with the torment of being utterly unable—was depicted as a dream. Her figure, symbolized by things like beautiful flowers, birds, or landscapes, smiled radiantly before him; yet when he tried to grasp it, various obstacles arose, making it nearly impossible to approach. No sooner did the cataclysms of antiquity preserved in the cells’ memory suddenly manifest before one’s eyes than towering mountains and precipitous cliffs from regions where ancestral protohumans once dwelled came into view. In the midst of this, one might have felt as though they had become their grandfather when he fell into destitution and begged, or swam across the great river their father once traversed, experiencing the same emotions. Or, having become a monkey to cross mountains or a fish to plunge into the sea—through countless hardships, finally obtaining her… a flower or a bird… only to realize that the initial tormenting feeling had vanished, at which point the dream too came to an end, and one awakened.

Due to bedwetting came dreams of primordial deluges. A congested nose forced reliving childhood near-drownings through dreamt agonies. Thus...whether hand or foot, viscera or skin patch—any locus sufficed. While the full body slept, cells roused by stimuli inevitably associated, fantasized, deluded about corresponding objects...perceiving some manner of dream-vision. That is—scenes matching or approximating the cell’s transient emotional state were haphazardly conjured from ancestrally inherited memories or the cell-protagonist’s own past recollections; through willful layering and concatenation of these elements arose depictions of utmost visceral intensity. Should such moods prove irrational or aberrant—lacking suitable associative material—they promptly compensated with imagined objects and landscapes cobbled together ad hoc. To express cellular terrors festering within human flesh came associations of kitchen implements writhing like earthworms/serpents; for pain’s articulation emerged visions of blood-dripping arboreal giants or blossoms blooming amidst flames—akin to wingèd angels conceived by those ignorant of mysteries’ true natures.

This stood in direct contrast to how our moods while awake changed as they were governed by surrounding circumstances; in dreams, the mood took precedence in shifting first. As that mood shifted, they endlessly transformed by chasing after scenery, features, and scenes that perfectly suited it; thus no matter how abrupt or illogical those transformations might be, one felt no contradiction or unnaturalness throughout. Not only that, but it seemed natural to perceive this as imparting a more authentic, profound, and poignant feeling than realistic impressions.

In other words, dreams could be described as a unique cellular art form that combines—without logic or coherence—symbolic forms, object memories, hallucinations, and clusters of associations representing moods and sensations comprehensible only to the cells themselves acting as the dream's protagonists, thereby depicting shifts in these emotional states with utmost clarity. ◇ Note: Modern trends in various Western art movements—through meaningless or fragmented colors/sounds or absurd combinations of scenes/objects—are gradually converging with dream expression methods by attempting to convey moods more acutely and profoundly than traditional realistic or commonsensical techniques.

As explained above, the true nature of dreams lies in the reflection of cells' own conscious content upon brain matter during their development, division, and proliferation; next, we shall clarify why the time perceived within dream content does not align with actual time. In other words, if one explains how general people—by believing the time indicated through clocks or the sun to be true time—are generating immense illusions, thereby introducing delusions into rigorous scientific judgments while becoming astonished and confounded, this question should immediately resolve itself.

According to modern medicine, one minute was defined as the standard duration corresponding to approximately eighteen calm breaths or around seventy pulse beats in an ordinary person. Sixty times that was defined as one hour, twenty-four times that as one day, and approximately three hundred sixty times that as one year. At the same time, that one year had been made equivalent to the duration of Earth's revolution around the sun, so the time indicated by clocks produced by reputable companies was established as being uniformly identical for everyone; however, this was ultimately artificial time, and the true nature of time was nothing of that sort. As proof of this, it was astonishing that when each individual separately experienced the same span of artificial time, tremendous discrepancies emerged.

To give a nearby example, even one hour measured by the same clock exhibits an astonishing difference in perceived length between an hour spent reading an interesting novel and an hour spent idly waiting for a train at the station. It is not possible for a length of one shaku measured with a bamboo ruler to appear uniformly as one shaku to everyone. Moreover, even when comparing one minute spent submerged underwater holding one’s breath with one minute spent engaged in idle chatter, it becomes evident upon reflection that the former feels unbearably long while the latter seems to pass in an instant... This must be an undeniable fact.

Taking this one step further, let us suppose there exists a dead person here. If this deceased individual continues to perceive time's flow through their insensate sensations even after death, then one second and one hundred million years should be felt as equally long. Moreover, this must constitute the true sensory experience after death—meaning one second contains one hundred million years within it, while simultaneously allowing the entire lifespan of the cosmos to be perceived within a single second. The true nature of infinite time flowing through this infinite universe proves to be precisely such an extreme illusion—one that within infinite truth remains motionless as an arrow yet races swift as a stone.

True Time is an entirely different entity from what is commonly conceived as Artificial Time. Rather than being connected to the revolutions of the sun, earth, or other celestial bodies—or to the turning of clock hands—it comes to be understood here that True Time remains static yet flows simultaneously for each and every individual sensation of all innumerable and boundless life forms, endowed with infinite elasticity particular to each. Next, when comparing the lifespans of life forms existing on earth—from plants that flourish for hundreds of years and large animals living over a century, down to microorganisms being born and dying within mere minutes or seconds—it generally appears that the smaller the organism's form, the shorter its lifespan. Cells are no exception; if we take the average of the long-lived and short-lived cells within each individual human body and compare it to the entirety of a human’s lifespan, we can consider that the difference is akin to that between the lifespan of a nation and that of an individual. However, the subjective perception of lifespan length for these various cells—whether long or short—remains the same; it has no relation to whether their birth-to-death span measures as one minute or a hundred years in Artificial Time. The actual length of time perceived during the process of being born, growing, reproducing, aging, and dying—each and every one of these is undeniably equivalent to the length of a single lifetime. For those ignorant of this principle to lament an infant’s pitifulness—born in the morning and dead by evening—while equating it with resigning oneself to an insect’s life—born in the morning and perishing of old age by dusk—is an absurdly unnatural and irrational notion; it amounts to nothing more than a tragicomedy arising from conflating rigid Artificial Time with infinitely elastic Natural Time.

All of nature... all living beings occupy this infinitely elastic natural time, each seizing an arbitrary length for themselves, breathing, growing, reproducing, and dying of old age while taking that length as their lifetime’s span. Similarly, however briefly the lifespan of human body cells may measure in artificial time, their inherent natural time must be infinite. Thus when these cells depict “dreams” through grand cyclical motions using their infinite memory content and infinite time, compressing fifty or a hundred years’ events into an instant—a single second—becomes a simple matter. In *The Tale of the Pillow of Kantan*, an ancient Chinese legend transmitted to Japan... Lu Sheng’s fifty years within a dream. That this states “in the time it takes to cook millet” is factual truth holding no mystery whatsoever.

Through what has been discussed above, the general outline of this fact would be understood: how supremely infinite the spiritual power of a single cell proves to be, and particularly how profoundly immeasurable resides within that singular entity called "Cellular Memory." I am convinced that through tangible acknowledgment of Cellular Memory's immense role—simultaneously gestating both human spirit and physical form—the myriad questions surrounding Fetal Dreams' existence... what compels such fetal behavior... will have been largely resolved.

The fetus existed in a state akin to an exceedingly deep sleep within the mother’s womb, being completely insulated from external sensory stimuli. During this period, the fetus’s entire body cells divided, proliferated, and evolved with vigor, all striving in unison “Toward human! Toward human!”—repeating memories of their ancestors’ evolutionary past while successively reflecting scenes from that era into the fetus’s consciousness. Moreover, as previously mentioned, the fetus was completely shielded from external stimuli by the maternal body while being nurtured in an extremely calm and orderly manner; thus, there was no need for it to think of anything else. The fetus needed only to single-mindedly preserve the solitary dream of “toward human, toward human,” and accordingly, the content of that dream transitioned with utmost smoothness, accuracy, and precision. This was precisely where it differed from the capricious, unrestrained dreams of adults.

To explain this conversely, what creates the fetus is the fetus’s own dream. Thus, what governs the fetal dream comes to be known as “Cellular Memory.” This is because all fetuses repeat the same evolutionary course within the womb over a universally fixed duration, and because current humankind has evolved from a common ancestor, resulting in cellular memory—that is, the length of “fetal dreams”—being uniformly consistent. Moreover, that these “Fetal Dreams”—which should span hundreds of millions or even billions of years—are experienced within a mere ten months is by no means inexplicable when considering the aforementioned spiritual power of cells; the relatively short gestation periods of lower-evolved animals stem from the comparative simplicity of their evolutionary recollections……Thus, lower microorganisms that have undergone no evolution since primordial times possess no “Fetal Dreams” whatsoever. The reason why ancestors split and proliferate in an instant while retaining their original forms should also be readily accepted there.

◇ Note: The aforementioned facts—namely, how profound and intricate "Cellular Memory" and other spiritual capacities of cells prove to be. As for how this exerts profound and subtle influence over the transmigration of all living beings’ descendants while governing the destiny of all existence—this had already been expounded in various scriptures rooted in Egyptian monotheism since several thousand years ago. Thus, the so-called religions clinging to existence across the world today are but fossilized remnants of superstition: rituals and expedient methods that embellished these scientific insights to instruct uncivilized peoples. Therefore, I particularly note here that the existence of fetal dreams is by no means a new theory.

Then, if we are to concretely explain the content of these “Fetal Dreams” that remain absent from our memories—what would they generally consist of? Cross-referencing this with all preceding clauses discussed thus far, I believe one could already sufficiently infer this content; nevertheless, for reference’s sake, should I attempt to outline my own hypothesis in broad terms, it must essentially take the following form. Among the ancestral evolutionary dreams witnessed by human fetuses within maternal wombs—what they must most abundantly experience are nightmares.

The reason is this: as humans evolved to their present state, they developed neither horns like cows nor claws or fangs like tigers; they equipped themselves with not a single one of nature’s tools for defense or attack—wings like birds, protective coloration like fish, poison like insects, or shells like shellfish. Compared to other animals, despite possessing a far frailer physique—harmless, non-venomous, and devoid of distinctive features—they were exposed as-is to every ferocious arena of survival competition, battling all manner of terrifying natural calamities and monstrous phenomena, until finally evolving and ascending to become the supreme animal we see today. During this period, they must have experienced pains of survival competition and persecutions of natural selection incomparable to those of other animals; these memories of hardships and ordeals would truly be immeasurable and boundless—so overwhelming as to leave one breathless. Among these, the fetus's ordeal—slowly and inexorably growing while vividly dreaming of their own past, of same-sex ancestral memories spanning hundreds of millions, tens of millions of years... while perceiving their duration as equal to reality... could never be matched by the brief, shallow sufferings their parents endure in this world.

First, a single cell that was the seed of a human took the form of a microorganism—the common ancestor of all living beings—and shortly after attaching to a certain point on the uterine wall, it began dreaming of itself in that form from hundreds of millions of years ago in the Azoic era, floating in lukewarm water alongside countless fellow microorganisms. In each individual of that countless—or even infinite—swarm of microorganisms, their transparent bodies absorbed and reflected the fierce light of the heavens, now emitting seven-colored rainbows, now scattering golden and silver glimmers, all while reveling in the primal freedom of Earth’s first lifeforms—floating aimlessly, swirling, swaying, splitting and perishing instant by instant in their ceaselessness. That joy. That beauty... but before they could even finish the thought, a slight change arose in the water they inhabited, transforming into indescribable agony that assailed them. The vast swarm of companions perished before one's eyes. I too tried to flee somewhere, but pain enveloping my entire body bound me, rendering me unable to move. The agony, the unbearable torment... Just when I thought such suffering had finally passed, the primordial sun bore down like raging fire, and the pale moonlight pierced through like ice. Scattered into the boundless void by the wind, or cast down into the endless abyss by the rain. Thus tossed about in a world of unimaginable terror and suffering, unaware of life or death... Ah, how I wished to become an even sturdier form. Wanting to become a body that could endure both cold and heat… while writhing in utter desperation, those cells gradually divided and multiplied, eventually taking the form of fish—the next ancestors of humans. That was to say, they took on an astonishingly advanced form, fully equipped with skin and scales to withstand heat and cold, fins and a tail for swimming, eyes and mouth, and nerves capable of judgment... Ah, how grateful—with this, there could be no complaints. A creature as clever as myself... Puffed up with pride, I strolled along the shoreline when—oh no!—an Octopus Monk thousands of times larger than my own body spread its heaven-blotting gigantic hands and came chasing after me. Ah!—Help me!—I fled into the seaweed forest and, holding my breath, barely managed to survive. When I finally relaxed and slowly started to lift my head, this time, an unimaginably massive sea scorpion’s pincers—dozens of times larger than the previous octopus—came pressing toward the tip of my nose. Just as I twisted around to flee once more in panic, a trilobite resembling a cloud descended upon me from behind. From the side, a sea anemone brandished poisonous spears. Escaping through that gap with my life, when I ducked under a pebble... Brr. Ah! What a shock! How pitiful. At this rate, I couldn’t go on living with any peace of mind.

The fellow creatures that had evolved alongside me, finding their surroundings perilous, encased their bodies in hard shells or stuck only their limbs out from between rocks—but I detested having to endure this dark, oppressive water by resorting to such measures. I wanted to get onto land even sooner than that. "I want to become a body that can leap freely and unrestrained in that light, bright air..." Through desperate prayer—thanks to that—I transformed into something resembling a small three-eyed lizard and nimbly crawled up onto the land.

...Ah! What joy! How grateful… Scarcely had I begun to look around frantically and scurry about when massive earthquakes, great eruptions, and colossal tsunamis—enough to obliterate the world—swirled up from all directions. The sea boiled like hot water with nowhere to escape. I gasped for breath while hopping across scorched sand. The agony... Just when I thought I had pushed through that suffering with a gasp, I found myself beneath the mountain-like foot of a Walking Dragon. A pterodactyl’s wing sent me flying. An Archaeopteryx’s monstrous beak nearly caught me... Ah... unbearable. Unbearable. Those who evolved alongside me grew spines across their bodies, mimicked nearby creatures’ colors and shapes, donned shells, or spat poison—but must I resort to such crippled, cowardly mimicry? As I hid between rocks, holding my breath and concentrating desperately... wondering if there wasn’t a way to settle into this hell while retaining a truer, unshackled form... the eyeball at my fontanelle vanished, and I emerged as a two-eyed monkey able to leap from tree to tree.

……There! I’d secured it now. Now I was safe.

No creature as free and advanced as I existed—so I thought, raising my hand from the tree hollow—when a python lunged to devour me from behind. Startled, I fled in terror only for a giant eagle to swoop down from above, talons aimed to strike me down. No sooner had I escaped through the branches than lice swarmed thickly across my body. Mountain leeches latched onto my skin. Amidst this ceaseless vigilance—whether sleeping or awake—cataclysmic thunderstorms, hurricanes, and blizzards soon engulfed the world, reducing trees and grass to ruin as I was driven to madness across the ravaged earth... Ah... The agony... Unbearable... I’d done nothing wrong—why must I endure such cruelty? "...Make me mightier... Let me face these calamities unflinching..." With my heart pounding, I thrust my head into the tree hollow and prayed until—at last—my tail fell away, granting me human form.

……Ah! What joy! Ah! How grateful! Just when I thought I could finally begin a life of paradise—not at all—the dream had yet to come to an end. No sooner did it assume human form than it immediately began to see human nightmares. The humans constituting the fetus's ancestral generations had accumulated immeasurable and boundless sinful deeds—varying in scale from great to small, inflicted directly or indirectly upon others—through mutual struggle for existence among fellow beings, the cruel and cowardly beastly psychology inherited since primitive times, and various other arbitrary selfish desires they sought to fulfill. Such bloody, suffocating memories, one by one, became the fetus’s present subjectivity and were reproduced before its eyes. ...scenes of assassinating lords to seize their castles... forcing loyal retainers to commit seppuku while sipping sake as entertainment... poisoning wives and heirs to install one’s own grandson as successor... starving ailing husbands to death while cavorting with lovers... the unbearable urge to smother newborn bastards... the perverse satisfaction of framing daughters-in-law for adultery and watching them hang... the exhilaration of shoving hated stepchildren down wells... the amusement of mobs tormenting innocent maidens... the pride in driving married men to lovelorn suicide... the sadistic pleasure of rounding up beautiful youths for abuse... the delight in squandering fortunes... the gravity of homosexual passions... the savor of human flesh... poison experiments... betrayals... test killings... bullying the weak... all these unbearable visions shifted with crystalline clarity through the dreamscape before its eyes. Or else their own ancestors… or past fetal selves—the crimes they concealed, the multitudes of secrets they took to their graves unspoken—manifested in dreams as blood-smeared faces, headless torsos, hair coiled in wells, daggers hidden in ceilings, white bones sunk in marsh bottoms, each vision surfacing one after another; and every time, the fetus startled, was tormented, writhed in agony, twitching and jerking its limbs within the mother’s womb.

Thus, after the fetus saw all the dreams up to its parents’ generation and finally had no more dreams left to see, it soon fell into a quiet slumber. Before long, labor began in the mother's body, and it was pushed out of the uterus. Air rushed into the fetus's lungs. At that jolt, the previous dreams retreated into the depths of the fetus’s unconscious, and a consciousness of reality—superficial yet intense and acute, utterly different from before—permeated throughout its entire body. Startled and terrified, it burst into uncontrollable sobs. In this way, the fetus...infant finally came into contact with boundless parental love and began to form peaceful, human-like dreams. And thus, it soon began to awaken to reality in order to create the continuation of "Fetal Dreams" within itself.

The reason infants—who should have no memories—suddenly startle awake crying during sleep or smile as if recalling something is that they are seeing remnants of the "Fetal Dreams" left unseen within the womb. For cases where there are congenital physical defects or mental deficiencies, there must have been corresponding dreams during the fetal period that explain their causes. Or consider how discoveries are sometimes made of cases where only fetal bones remain in the womb, or so-called monstrous fetuses—mere clumps of matted hair and teeth. These must be the remnants left when the fetus’s dreams either stagnated due to some cause or developed too rapidly, becoming unsustainable and ceasing entirely.—End—

An Unparalleled Testament

——Taisho 15th Year, October 19th Night

――Notes of the Mad Doctor

Hear ye, hear ye! Ye who dwell afar, take your bearings through telescopes! Ye who draw near, press close and peer through microscopes! I am none other than Masaki Keishi - he who has gained renown as the Mad Doctor within Kyushu Imperial University's Department of Psychiatry!

On this very day, to turn inside out the guts of all common sense-mongers under heaven, I hereby present—as prelude to my sudden self-slaughter—an unparalleled testament through the ages. Let this written challenge determine whether its reader or writer be fool, madman, or true contender... Let all who deem themselves arbiters of common sense harken well—anoint your brows with spittle and come forth to meet me! ...Well, I did begin writing... but there's no punch to it at all.

......That can't be right. I was now seated in my swivel chair before my desk in the Kyushu Imperial University Department of Psychiatry’s main building upper-floor professor’s office, a square whiskey bottle positioned within reach, fountain pen held at a slant as I glared face-to-face with several sheets of Western-style large-format ruled paper. The electric clock overhead had just ticked past ten in the evening... Purple smoke swayed lazily from the cigar clenched sideways in my mouth... Nothing more than the pitiful sight of a wretched professor burning the midnight oil on his research. At this rate, by this time tomorrow, no one would believe I’d have kicked the bucket. ……Ahahaha…….

I have a disposition where if I don't transcend common sense in this manner, I simply can't rest easy— In any case, I sympathize with all you common sense-mongers under heaven who consider me a type of madman.

So here I am… utterly at a loss about where to begin writing… After all, this was my first time ever writing a will—never before had I done so, nor would there ever be another chance.

However, if I were to play at being an ordinary person here and structure this writing in common-sense order... then foremost I must clarify my motive for suicide. First and foremost, I can assert that my motive for suicide is connected to a certain lovely young girl... Ahem. Don’t you dare laugh. To begin with, the girl’s beauty was such that it would be quicker grasped were I to simply write twenty or thirty lines declaring it utterly, ineffably beyond measure and then stop. Even if one were to drag out every last handkerchief box, cosmetic label, women's magazine cover, tailor's advertising mannequin, beer hall placard, and department store poster from across the globe... even if they overturned every European and American film studio... they still couldn't match this sacrilegiously pure, painfully fragrant, unnervingly alluring... Ahahahahaha! Let’s leave it at that.

I can’t have people misunderstanding that I’ve grown utterly disillusioned with this world after being spurned by some beauty in a manner unbecoming of my age... I’ll have none of such concerns from my side, thank you very much. I must confess—that girl was removed from the human registry about half a year ago... Now then, some common sense-monger might come rushing in, jumping to conclusions like ‘So you’re abandoning this world because that girl died…’ but hold on a moment… Don’t be so hasty. That girl currently registered in the deceased's census is soon to form a pledge of eternal union with a jewel-like beautiful youth whose elegance rivals her own dazzling appearance—an utterly incomparable match. Thus would my earthly business reach its conclusion... Should I declare this, some clever dementia patient would materialize... and then it’s finally time for a proper suicide-by-madness! They probably think I lost my mind from dreaming of love scenes between a dead beautiful girl and a living beautiful youth... or something along those lines.

……Well, I was shocked. I never knew writing a will would be this difficult—such an intense task. However, even so, since I was going to the trouble of killing myself, I thought there’d be no impact afterward if I didn’t write something down, so I wrote this as a sort of obligation—but let me confess: through the actual kissing and embracing of that deceased beauty and the vibrantly alive handsome youth, the fundamental principle of mental science that had been my life’s work—that is, the research publication we called psychological heredity—was set to reach its experimental conclusion in splendid, splendid fashion.

How about that? Could there possibly exist another such fascinating, thrilling academic experiment anywhere else? Ahahaha....

No. There likely was none... For one, the discipline of mental science forming this experiment's foundation belonged to my own unique invention... Moreover, even within that framework, my proprietary psychiatric experiments differed from ordinary medicine in that they couldn't be conducted using birds, beasts, or human corpses as subjects. The reason was that birds and beasts—much like certain psychiatric patients—proved unsuitable as research material from the outset due to their raw animalistic nature, while dead humans lacked the crucial souls required for experimental material. One absolutely had to use as material the correct, healthy minds of vibrant, lively humans. The necessity to meticulously study and document how such splendid minds suddenly went mad before gradually recovering—observing their transformations before and after—made this an immensely challenging task. To compound matters, the material I'd selected as my research focus—which current scholarly convention would label hereditary homicidal mania coupled with early-onset dementia and perverse sexual desires—constituted such an extraordinarily convoluted entity that it became an utterly troublesome affair.

The individuals chosen as material for such experiments were by no means ordinary. Given that carelessness might lead them to crush me, I had embarked on this experiment from the very beginning with my life on the line—only to end up driven to suicide by the backlash of that very experiment... No. Since there remained considerable time before my suicide, I would calmly—thoroughly and completely—settle myself to leisurely wield my fountain pen in company with purple smoke and amber-hued liquid.

Gentlemen, pray read carefully. Calling it a will or whatever—it’s a carefree affair. It’s a different matter from Namanda-style invocations, Amen-style prayers, or regret-filled lamentations. It’s akin to an entertaining sideshow from the Mad Doctor’s mad experiment. The lingering smoke served as the punchline’s revelation……For here unfolded—as clear as if held in one’s palm—the hidden mechanism behind how my crowning experiment on the aberrant sexual proclivities of that unprecedented beautiful youth and peerless maiden at my research’s core became governed by whatever academic principles tensed and intensified until poised to explode through spontaneous ignition—shattering this experimenter’s entire existence…….

The story goes back a little earlier. I must confess I was utterly daunted by the sheer scale of public backlash when my discourse titled "The Brain Is Not the Seat of Thought" was serialized in the academic column of a certain Fukuoka newspaper one day this past October. I wasn't entirely unaware that "humans are creatures petrified by vanity and superstition," but even so, I hadn't realized until this very moment that they could prove this imbecilic. They—the common sense-mongers—sought to pulverize my heresies through every conceivable means: through newspapers, through magazines, through painstakingly composed letters, and with even greater fastidiousness through direct audiences with me. What proved particularly gut-wrenching was how within this very university that trumpeted research freedom as its motto, those decorous professors stroking their chins and twisting their mustaches all rose as one: "Expel that irrational, arrogant, indecent madman scholar! "Failing that, drive him into the red bricks!"—so saying, they hammered their desks and besieged the university president.

Even I, a seasoned veteran of countless battles, found myself ready to bolt when I heard this. I had believed the university to be the sole safe haven for academic research, only for it to turn out to be a veritable jack-in-the-box—how utterly unforeseen! Fortunately, the President—a man of bureaucrat-like non-interventionism—managed to muddle through skillfully, allowing me to scrape by until today. But even so, when you think about it, isn’t this an absurdly idiotic tale? If we’re talking about people who become Douse-like doctors or university professors, they’re determined to be at best a bunch of honor maniacs or research maniacs. Without feeling the slightest shame about it themselves, these honor maniacs and research maniacs—who rank just one tier above me—now seize upon my person to brand me a madman, making this situation so laughably absurd I can hardly bear it. How utterly absurd I found this situation at the time is known to my dear friend Dean Moriyama.

“Under this half-baked arrangement, I could never safely publish my mental anatomy, mental physiology, psychopathology, psychological heredity and such—it’s far too dangerous.” “After all, it’s an academic theory asserting psychiatric patients possess greater resolve than ordinary people.” “Hahaha…” “Quite so.” “Most remain oblivious to how nothing insults humanity quite like science does.” “Precisely! But isn’t it a wondrous spectacle—those who preen themselves upon hearing ‘humans descend from apes’… yet fly into indignant rage when told ‘You’re all madmen’?” “Not only do they ignore how apes evolved into humans and humans into madmen.” “They appear to have the entire evolutionary sequence completely inverted.” “Bwahahaha—!”

That we merely laughed together over such things… Therefore, I even withheld from publication the “Brain Matter Theory” I had procured and kept on hand for revisions and additions. And now today, roughly half a year later, I’ve gathered all those manuscript drafts together and burned them to ashes.

Oh, nothing. There’s no particular reason. Because it’s tedious. Human culture remains absurdly immature to accept my research...... Moreover, my own absurdity—having failed to notice this monumental truth through twenty long years of persisting in such outlandish studies billowing black smoke—has now become excruciatingly clear to me. Or perhaps my mental aberration is beginning to subside like this... Ha ha...

...However...I resolved to preserve only the choicest cuts—the juiciest loin portions—from those writings within this testament, to serve as reference for mad scholars who might conceive such research in an appropriate era. Even among these, the contents of my "Brain Matter Theory"—as per the clippings inserted here—had already been thoroughly exposed in the newspapers, leaving nothing further to disclose, so there remained absolutely nothing regrettable about their loss. Furthermore, as the essence of my research spanning from mental anatomy to psychopathology was already contained within this thesis titled "Fetal Dreams," which I had submitted to Kyushu University twenty years ago as my graduation paper, I decided to omit detailed explanations here and instead briefly outline the relationship between my crowning achievement—"Liberation Therapy for Madmen"—and "Psychological Heredity."

If one reads this alongside the earlier newspaper articles and the thesis on Fetal Dreams, the uncanny workings of mental science's academic principles—wherein the aforementioned bizarre experiment employing a beautiful youth and maiden as material simultaneously heralded an unprecedented success and ended in an unparalleled failure at noon on October 19, Taisho 15 (that is, today)—would become vividly and unmistakably clear. At the same time, all that common sense and scholarly knowledge representing the pinnacle of modern culture would be shattered into splinters in one fell swoop, leaving behind only empty skulls piled in heaps... or so the reasoning went...

Now then... Er... I thought I'd excuse myself here for a moment and relight this extinguished cigar... It was actually my favorite. No matter how impoverished my life became, I never went without this guy and alcohol by my side... But since I’d now reached the point of counting how many of these I’d smoke before dying, I had to ask for your indulgence. Bwahaha…

“Thank you for your patience... Now then... It seems everyone who witnessed that ‘Liberation Therapy Field for Madmen’—the very creation that directly precipitated my journey to paradise—regarded it as nothing more than a madmen’s promenade.” Some among them read newspaper articles and went “Ah! Now I see,” nodding sagely—only for others to immediately chime in with remarks like “Quite so! This setup prevents the lunatics from getting overexcited,” or “Ah— “It’s a form of light therapy, no?” With nothing beyond such know-it-all posturing, it’s laughable how none pierced through to this experiment’s true nature. No. The secret remained unbreached even to assistants and junior researchers in this department—they merely grasped it as some lofty, transcendent experiment... when in truth it’s trifling... yet marvelously intriguing. “Liberation Therapy” That pompous appellation was but a decoy to hoodwink society.

To be perfectly frank, this "liberation therapy" experiment constitutes nothing less than the practical application of a thesis I once wrote titled "Fetal Dreams" upon graduating from Fukuoka Medical University, this institution’s predecessor. However, while the examples I marshaled in "Fetal Dreams" concerned psychological heredity common to all humans—basic impulses like hunger, sleep, play, conflict, and victory—exceedingly commonplace varieties of phenomena, what we investigate here delves far deeper into extreme, idiosyncratic eruptions of psychological heredity unique to specific individuals. The recent vogues for morbid curiosities and detective manias don’t hold a candle to phenomena so mystifyingly cutting-edge, grotesquely uncanny, and utterly venomous... Well, since I’ve yet to witness them myself—show me. “Nothing could be simpler.” “I shall now present it before your very eyes…”

“Step right up! Step right up! What you see here—nowhere else in all the world will you find living specimens of karmic souls! Daylight phantoms! Noontime monsters! Sliiime-dripping scientific experiments—right here, right here! Admission ten sen for adults, half-price for children, free for the blind! Ah—no shoving now! You’ll be laughed at by the madmen, I tell you! Quiet now, quiet...”

……Ahem……. “What I now present before you is the ‘Natural Color Stereoscopic Talkie’ of the Liberation Therapy Field for Madmen—established by Professor Masaki of Kyushu Imperial University’s Department of Psychiatry—situated behind the main building of said department.” “This projection apparatus was recently developed through collaboration between Ophthalmology’s Dr. Tanisaki, Otolaryngology’s Professor Kanatsubo, and Dr. Masaki at Kyushu Imperial University’s School of Medicine for medical research purposes—an engineering marvel without peer... Current American experiments with sound films and talkies pale in comparison... I urge you to witness how not one iota of difference exists between screen image and physical reality.”

“Now… first and foremost, we present for your viewing a full panoramic view of Kyushu Imperial University’s School of Medicine on the screen.”

As you can see, both the interior and exterior of Kyushu Imperial University's campus were entirely blanketed by an unbroken expanse of pine grove greenery. At its western edge, beneath two large chimneys standing side by side, you might observe a shabby blue-painted Western-style two-story building—this being the main hall of the psychiatry department where resided the world-renowned "Mad Doctor," Dr. Masaki. Immediately to its south lay a square plot of approximately two hundred tsubo—what we shall now introduce as the "Liberation Therapy Field for Madmen."......The aircraft carrying both camera equipment and technicians gradually descended, landing upon the southern window ledge of the psychiatry department's main building upper floor. ...resembling something like a dragonfly or fly... let us set the time as Taisho 15, October 19... at exactly 9:00 a.m.

The red brick wall surrounding this Liberation Therapy Field stood fifteen feet in height. The square flatland enclosed by this [wall] was entirely composed of this region's distinctive pure white quartz-based sand, making it unsurpassably clean. In the center stood about five paulownia trees, each bearing a single yellow withered leaf. These paulownia trees had stood here since time immemorial, having formed part of the main building's garden scenery; yet since they leveled the surrounding ground to establish this Liberation Therapy Field, they had manifested such marked signs of decline that one might indeed call it an ominous portent. It might also be considered that these paulownia trees were exhibiting mental abnormalities due to having been confined in such an unexpected location; however, our department had yet to determine a diagnosis regarding that matter. ...I have spoken nonsense and must apologize profusely.

The entrance to the therapy field lay near the eastern patient ward—the only opening that also served as a passage to the toilets—but through a small horizontal slit cut beside its wooden door, a hulking man in black uniform and cap, his features coarse, peered cold-eyed into the grounds from dawn till dusk as you observed here; observing this scene, one might perceive the entire square Liberation Therapy Field as resembling a giant magical box set amidst waves of greenery.

Upon the white sand spread across the bottom of this magical box—bathed in the azure light of the sky and glittering brilliantly across its surface—black human figures moved about, standing and sitting. One person... two people... three people... four people... five people... six people... amounting to ten people in total.

These were the madmen moving under the governance of the "Psychological Heredity" principle—derived from Dr. Masaki's so-called "Brain Matter Theory" and serving as the continuation of "Fetal Dreams." ...Moreover...precisely three hours later...when noon arrived on October 19, Taisho 15...as a thunderous noon cannon resounded from Odaiba across the bay...this would serve as the signal for an extraordinary psychological heredity catastrophe—utterly unforeseen—to erupt from among these ten madmen...shocking the world’s senses while simultaneously driving Dr. Masaki to resolve upon suicide...yet even then...phenomena that might be called precursors to this great tragedy were already clearly manifesting within this Liberation Therapy Field...I earnestly entreated you to fix your gaze attentively...and meticulously observe every movement of these madmen.

To facilitate your detailed observation, we now present close-up views of each of these ten madmen individually.

First, what we now presented was a white-haired old man working diligently while stripped to the waist beside the western red brick wall. As you observed, this old man gripped a single hoe in both hands and tilled approximately two and a half furrows of a long field running parallel to the brick wall; yet when examining his physique—as evident before your eyes—not only did his arms and shins appear pale and slender, but he also lacked the deep neck wrinkles characteristic of elderly laborers, leading one to conclude he could not possibly have any experience in such farming work. What was particularly pitiable were his palms; since he gripped a hoe, they were not clearly visible, but one could see black stains dotted here and there adhering to various parts of the hoe’s handle. Those were traces of blood oozing from the torn parts of his palms. Moreover... when observing how this old man continued swinging his hoe without yielding or bending—working diligently despite it all—one could largely comprehend just how cruel and rigorous Dr. Masaki's Psychological Heredity experiments must have been.

Next, what we now present is a young man standing beside him, observing the old man’s farming work. As you can see, he wears a dark cotton kimono with an old-fashioned white cotton heko-obi and has his hair left wild and unkempt, which may make him appear somewhat older; however, upon closer observation, you will discern that he is in fact a fresh-faced youth of around twenty years old. Perhaps from having emerged into sunlight after so long, his skin was as pale as a woman’s, with faintly rosy cheeks, and while wearing a faint smile, he intently watched the hands of the white-haired old man swinging the hoe. If you looked only at his expression, you might think him an ordinary person—but pray observe more carefully. The clarity of his eyes and the light within his pupils... they appeared as serenely pure as those of a princess raised in secluded chambers. This is a characteristic exhibited by certain types of psychiatric patients either before returning to sanity or shortly before an episode—an ocular expression that Dr. Masaki, who continually handled such cases, found particularly difficult to discern between true madness and feigned madness in his diagnostic assessments.

Next, the lens was brought closer to a girl crouching far behind the old man and young man. As you could see, she had a ghostly pale, emaciated face covered in freckles with reddish-brown hair tied back, and was crouching at the edge of the field created by the old man, planting various things with her delicate hands. Paulownia leaves, pine branches, bamboo fragments, broken roof tiles and such... Among them were even green grasses—who knew where she had found them. However, given that this other party’s field consisted of furrows of dry white sand, as you observed, she fussed over them in various ways to keep bamboo sticks and such standing straight, as they were prone to toppling over if left unattended. One might have thought it unnecessary to go through such troublesome effort—that simply thrusting them into the sand would suffice—but with all due respect, that was an amateurish notion… For this girl remained utterly convinced that roof tile fragments and bamboo sticks were ordinary flowers or seedlings, and thus she would never subject them to such rough treatment. She took such care to mound sand around their bases—the very value of her efforts lay there... Yet despite all her devoted tending, when those bamboo sticks toppled over two or three times—oh!—she flew into a rage and tore them out as effortlessly as one might pluck tender seedlings, casting them aside. One could only marvel at how such terrifying strength—surpassing even that of men—emanated from those delicate, slender arms, but in truth, human beings—even the gentlest of ladies—generally possessed that degree of power. However... due to accumulated ancestral conditioning that humans—particularly women—were refined yet weak compared to other animals... they remained unable to exert their full potential strength. When this conditioning broke—whether through mental aberration or encountering crises like earthquakes or fires—they reverted to their innate physical power, as this young girl now vividly demonstrated. I must apologize for my repeated digressions in explanation, but as this very case served to inversely demonstrate Dr. Masaki’s “Psychological Heredity” principle, I felt compelled to provide this additional clarification.

Next to be presented was a small man with a chestnut-burr head wearing a torn morning coat, currently delivering a speech toward the eastern red brick wall on the directly opposite side from where the group comprising the old man, young man, and girl were situated. “...Bodhidharma faced the wall for nine years and came to be called Kumano of Shaolin.” “Therefore, we have spent nine years facing the wall to hone our arguments, shattered the haphazardly patched and chaotic political world, and aimed to flatten all inequalities... in the coming era of universal suffrage... that is to say... we...”

No sooner had he shouted loudly than he suddenly raised his right hand high and waved it from side to side as if struck by a thought.

Behind him passed a woman of strange appearance. As you could observe, she was a truly vulgar, scowling-faced middle-aged woman whose mud smeared all over her face was said to be intended as heavy makeup. Her kimono hem exposed and her feet bare, she dragged a tattered round obi that trailed behind her. Perched atop her disheveled head—who could have fashioned such a thing?—rested a crown-shaped object made of cardboard painted with red ink. Tipping her head back to keep it from falling while glaring sharply from side to side with regal airs, she paced back and forth—a most extraordinary spectacle indeed.

Each time that woman crossed before him, the large bearded man prostrating himself at the base of the paulownia tree and offering worship time and again was none other than the principal of a certain elementary school in Nagasaki. The generational Christian faith of his ancestors had reached its zenith in this man, resulting in his confinement to this hospital, whereupon he carved holy images into brick and roof tile fragments and compelled his fellow patients to worship them. Now, believing his queen-aping madwoman to be the reincarnation of Holy Mary, he shed tears of fervent adoration.

Then again, the girl with long straight hair hopping around that prostrating bearded man had been a second-year student at a girls' high school who originally possessed an introverted, melancholic disposition; however, after demonstrating extraordinary talent in the arts, she developed what was termed dementia praecox. ...Yet upon contracting her illness, her former personality underwent a complete transformation. When first admitted here and asked her name by Director Masaki, she responded, "I am a dance maniac... Anna Pavlova," becoming the hospital's most endearing character. As you could observe, she perpetually sang self-composed songs while dancing about.

“When I looked up at the blue-blue sky,” White-white clouds float high-high Black-black clouds hang low-low Nicely-nicely lined up side by side Flutter-flutter, fly away Flutter-flutter-flutter… la-la… I wanna line up-lined up together too Flutter-flutter, if I walk along ah I bumped into the red-red wall ah Flutter-flutter-flutter… la-la… “Flutter-flutter-flutter… la-la…”

Meanwhile, over here, two craftsman-like men around forty appeared intimate with their arms linked as they paced back and forth in a direction perpendicular to the aforementioned middle-aged woman. The man on the far right was sightseeing in Tokyo while the one on the left was exploring Antarctica; having hit it off so splendidly, they continued their grand journey together—truly a handful to manage. Then there was the plump old woman sitting near this entrance—her elegant kimono pattern suggested she had once been a person of considerable status, yet she herself seemed unaware of this, perpetually dressed as though she inhabited slums, picking off and crushing nonexistent lice with desperate intensity, plucking at them only to discard... when suddenly—oh!—she untied her obi to become completely naked and began beating her garments with loud slaps, whereupon each time the orator, two craftsmen, and schoolgirl alike halted their psychological heredity episodes to point, stare, and clutch their stomachs in laughter.

Now then... Among those of you who observed the movements of the madmen we projected thus far, there must certainly be some who found this unexpectedly ordinary. “What the... This is it?” “Isn’t this just an ordinary madman?” “This isn’t something unique to this Liberation Therapy Field.” “No matter which psychiatric hospital’s walking grounds you visit, can’t you see such sights anywhere?” “Given it’s called a Liberation Therapy Field for Madmen, I thought we’d witness some grand spectacle—a vast open space teeming with hundreds or thousands of lunatics performing every conceivable act of madness! But this? This is utterly anticlimactic.” “To begin with, this ‘Psychological Heredity’—I can’t detect a single trace of heredity in any of this!” ...I have no doubt some of you now feel disappointed, disheartened, contemptuous or sneering—but pray wait without haste.

Now, I am certain there are those among you who felt disappointment, dismay, contempt, and sneering—but pray do not be so hasty. To speak truthfully, the individuals employed in Dr. Masaki's research on psychological heredity experiments were amply represented by these alone—indeed, had I briefly explained through film how even two or three of these mad behaviors being enacted through psychological heredity operated, you would have comprehended without exception every cause behind all mental derangements existing throughout the world... In short, these ten psychiatric patients were representative champions of madness selected from countless lunatics across the earth—or rather, they might be viewed as international specimens manifesting to bodily demonstrate the principles of psychological heredity underlying Dr. Masaki's research over these past twenty years—I must inform you.

First and foremost among those I now humbly present is that white-haired old man who had been tilling the field beside the red brick wall from earlier. This old man was called Hachimaki Gisaku, but his ancestor five generations prior—that is to say, Gisaku’s great-great-grandfather—had been a renowned wealthy farmer by the same name Giju who resided in Torikai Village within the castle town of Fukuoka. This man named Giju was left-handed from birth but possessed considerable physical strength and vitality. Within his lifetime, using nothing but a single hoe, he amassed a great fortune. It is said he became a legendary figure in success stories when Lord Kuroda granted him the surname Hachimaki and permission to wear a sword.

Now then, when one inquires why he came to receive such an unusual surname, this "Hachimaki" was originally a nickname from the man’s younger days. In other words, this nickname originated from his practice—valuing every moment too much to spare time for wiping sweat—of always tying a hand towel as a rear headband above his eyebrows while working in the fields. From this alone, you may well imagine how fiercely he must have labored. He would rest only once between dawn and dusk—when the timekeeping drum at Maizuru Castle’s keep tower in Fukuoka sounded BOOM at the Hour of Horse, what we now call noon, he would immediately throw down his hoe and go eat his lunch beneath a nearby embankment, in grassy shade, or under eaves. Then after about half a koku—which equates to one hour in modern terms, I must inform you. During that interval—after taking his midday nap—when he abruptly awakened only to find the sun had already set, he would continue working without rest until his hands became invisible in the dark... Such vigorous resolve suggests this man too must have possessed a disposition bordering on obsessive-compulsive personality. The white horizontal mark from the hachimaki headband that remained on his reddish-black forehead did not disappear even after he drew his last breath. Even when appearing before his lordship, this remained unchanged, so when a flustered attendant by his side exclaimed, “Remove that hachimaki at once!”—his lordship became greatly amused and bestowed upon him this surname, making it a hachimaki of such extraordinary honor—I must inform you.

However, as time passed and circumstances changed, when it came to this Old Man Gisaku—the fifth-generation descendant from that Hachimaki Giemon—the honorable hachimaki surname, the left-handedness, and regrettably even that great fortune were all lost somewhere along the way, leaving him reduced to working as a craftsman at Hakata's famous brush shop. And so upon reaching old age in this manner—his eyes growing dim until he could no longer handle fine brush hairs—he was forced out of his occupation. Tormented by this outcome, he developed mental disturbances and met the pitiful fate of being taken to this university about a week ago—I must inform you.

However, here lay the marvel. It was not long after Dr. Masaki had released this old man into the liberation therapy field to investigate the motive behind his insanity—that is, the content of his Psychological Heredity. When he found a hoe that a janitor had left behind in a corner of the grounds after killing a snake with it, he immediately began imitating his ancestor. Though he did not wear the hachimaki headband, as you could observe, he had not once wiped his sweat from the very start. Moreover, his grip on the hoe had become left-handed—the complete opposite of his pre-madness state—and upon hearing the twelve o'clock noon cannon, he threw down the hoe, returned to his hospital room, quickly finished his meal, and plopped down onto his bed with such precision that one could only perceive him as the reincarnation of Giju from five generations prior. However, once he fell asleep—perhaps due to extreme fatigue—he remained dead to the world straight through until morning, not eating supper or anything else. In his dreams, he likely became his great-great-grandfather Giju and built a grand fortune once more—I must inform you.

...This concludes our first example of Psychological Heredity... Should any questions arise, please feel free to raise your hand without hesitation. Next, allow me to introduce the diminutive gentleman in the tattered morning coat who has been orating toward the red brick wall since earlier. This selection proves particularly instructive when we examine three elements: his right hand perpetually gesticulating mid-air; his left hand frozen in a posture suggesting it supports some invisible object; and most crucially, the specific terminology permeating his speeches—all of which shall serve as invaluable reference points in our analysis.

“...This is a great barrier lying across the empire’s future path.” “If superficial ideologies continue to run rampant as they do today, and patchwork politics persist indefinitely, then our Japanese nation’s unity—like a mud wall without mixed straw—will soon meet its fate of crumbling collapse beneath the storms of foreign thought...” How about that? As you have heard from earlier, in the speeches of this chestnut-headed Dr. Flock, terms such as “wall” or expressions related to walls frequently appear. Namely, this small man’s maternal grandfather was a plasterer employed by the Kuroda Domain—I must ask you not to laugh. This is no rakugo comedy... I must clarify—the grandfather plasterer, while engaged in work atop Fukuoka Castle’s keep tower on one occasion, accidentally slipped and fell to a gruesome death. Moreover, this grandfather had originally prided himself on his agility in all matters... When re-plastering the donjon roof’s tiles, it is said the lord himself observed his daring feats through a telescope—I must inform you. Moreover, due to his habitual practice of working with extremely simplified scaffolding even during ordinary times, while his work was completed swiftly, he repeatedly endangered his life by losing his footing or getting caught mid-task—yet always survived miraculously.

However—at what age this occurred, I must ask—while he was once again working atop the keep tower’s highest roof within his lordship’s telescopic view, he inadvertently turned his backside toward his lordship. Then, the supervising clerk who had been looking up at this from below—instead of stopping him—raised a loud voice: "Mind your posture—!" ...due to the unnecessary warning—“His Lordship is watching from the main keep—!”—he must have involuntarily stiffened. Suddenly losing his footing, he tumbled down from the several-jō-high stone wall and met his end in shattered pieces. Since that time, the plastering trade of that household has died out, I must inform you. However, when the blood of that grandfather passed through his daughter to this small man in the morning coat, it becomes a terrifying thing to behold. Even during his middle school years, this man would occasionally startle awake in the middle of the night and shout things like "Help me!"—a habit he possessed. Each time this happened, his family members would be startled and ask him calmly, “What’s wrong?”—to which he would reply, “It felt like I was falling headfirst from some high roof or a place that seemed above the clouds.” How utterly strange, wouldn’t you agree? That even in what appears to ordinary eyes as trivial, mild sleepwalking episodes, there reappears the memory of absolute terror experienced countless times by ancestors several generations prior—in those startled moments when they gasped “Ah!”—what a wondrous example of Psychological Heredity this presents, wouldn’t you agree? …No—nay! Is this phenomenon limited solely to the Orator Patient? I must declare it is not. Generally speaking, when we consider in light of these examples the phenomenon where we sometimes feel as though we are falling from a great height during sleep and awaken with a start, it is by no means particularly mysterious. That the memories of utterly tragic and anguished thoughts from moments when anyone—be it our parents, grandparents, or others—must have experienced once or twice those desperate realizations like “Oh no!” or “I’m going to die!”, having become a form of Psychological Heredity, now manifest themselves again within us descendants is something no one could possibly doubt, I must declare.

Are there any questions…? Now, as an additional introduction, she is the middle-aged woman wearing a cardboard crown on her head and pacing back and forth. As discernible from the meticulous arrangement of her collar folds, she was the daughter of a merchant family sold into geisha service—yet due to her considerable charms, she was soon to be redeemed by a young banker and made his mistress. However, when the banker’s old-fashioned parents refused—under the pretext of “social disparity”—to permit her installation as his lawful wife, she grew consumed by resentment over this exclusion alone. Consequently, at a certain banquet, she suddenly turned to a first-time patron and snapped: “Who do you think you are…? How dare you offer a cup to someone like me!”—whereupon she smashed the sake cup against him and crushed the shamisen underfoot… Thus did she become proprietor of such a sensational episode that saw her promptly delivered to this very ward. Yet while this reaction may seem excessive—particularly in our modern age of progressive thought and given her transient profession—herein lies the terror of Psychological Heredity: the phrase “social disparity” struck far deeper than mere wounded pride, as evidenced by her post-onset demeanor. Observe how every aspect—from her posture and gaze to her very gait—exudes cultivated refinement mirroring an upper-court noblewoman. This demonstrates through her mental aberration that her lineage before the Restoration comprised Kyoto’s Nabatori court nobles—those who failed to establish themselves as proper impoverished aristocracy—hence her registered surname Kiyogahara bears no resemblance to commoner names. In essence, prior to her illness, she likely affected merchant-class manners under environmental influences—but once her mind became disordered, she utterly discarded the plebeian habits formed over recent generations, instead manifesting her ancestral courtly bearing in pure form.

“Yes… Do you have a question?” “Please, go ahead…” “…Hmm… I see… Indeed… Most eminently reasonable… I understand perfectly.” “In other words—are you suggesting ‘Psychological Heredity’ amounts to nothing more than *this*? That Dr. Masaki has been staking his life on research of such… *limited scope*?” “…You have me there.” “Anticipating this esteemed question would arise, the film editors thoughtfully arranged for Dr. Masaki—discoverer of Psychological Heredity himself—to be projected next onto the main screen, where he shall deliver a lecture addressing your query.” “…As Kyushu University’s mad scientist—more renowned than Einstein or Steinach—when Dr. Masaki appears onscreen, I earnestly hope you’ll greet him with applause thunderous enough to crack the heavens.” “The reason being—the man himself so adored applause that even during lectures, his greatest delight came from making students clap… But… wait… If he’s inside the screen, wouldn’t our clapping be inaudible…?…” “Ha ha ha.” “Most eminently reasonable… yet wondrously audible it remains—I must declare.” “The proof lies in practice—strike it and see… As for the trick’s mechanism—observe with wary eyes and you’ll soon discern… Ahem, ahem…………”

...Well... This is none other than the world-renowned Kyushu Imperial University Faculty of Medicine Professor of Psychiatry, Doctor of Medical Science, Dr. Masaki Keishi—I must present. The backdrop showed Kyushu Imperial University’s Psychiatry Department Main Building—the lecture hall’s board—and there on screen stood his usual lecturing self in a white examination gown—I must inform you. As your eyes have discerned, he was a small, swarthy man standing precisely five shaku and one sun tall—his round salt-and-pepper head cropped so short it gleamed; large pince-nez glasses glittering on either side of a high nose; beneath them, deeply sunken eyes sharp as blades; a wide mouth drawn taut in a horizontal line; and an expression behind those spectacles so skeletal it might chill the blood—there he stood blocking the table, surveying you all in one sweep before baring his full set of dentures in a laugh that radiated vigor from every pore, gall from every limb, intellect from every fiber...

Now... I must ask you not to laugh. …What. “Questions… Yes, yes? What is it?” “Ha ha.” Whether the ‘I’ who was explaining and Dr. Masaki on the screen were one and the same or different individuals…

“Ha ha ha ha ha ha.” “This is a blunder... I must promptly withdraw and let the me on the screen... No.” I decided to have Dr. Masaki provide the explanation.

[Narrator Vanishes]

[Dr. Masaki on the projection screen gestures and speaks accordingly.] ...Ahem... Hmm... "...It is the greatest honor of my life—and my utmost satisfaction—to meet with all you new gentlemen of the world here upon this silver screen. "You gentlemen are people who dwell in the world of common sense while yearning for the world of the nonsensical. Now, across every corner of this earth—where trains and steamships exhaust their routes, where automobiles and airplanes dart into every crevice—there lies solemnly plastered and frozen solid the social conventions, superstitions toward science, imitations of foreign lands, and dead moral concepts… all that comprises modern society’s so-called common sense. Those who have grown utterly weary of this, whose hearts thirst for expressions of life’s own truth—vividly dynamic and freely unrestrained—and who observe with eyes blazing with overflowing curiosity the experiments of my life’s work, 'Psychological Heredity,' will comprehend it at once. The fact that ordinary mentally ill individuals—being governed by some force—are those who act in certain ways was readily acknowledged without any difficulty. Not only that—your curiosity, unsatisfied with this alone, compelled you to pose questions that advanced a hundred-foot pole’s summit by yet another step. They inquired... 'Is Psychological Heredity merely that limited?'... and... In other words, your brains rival my twenty years' research... No... with a clarity and speed surpassing that of Dr. Masaki the Madman's brain... No... thank you. 'It’s too early for applause… On this point, I wish to express my deepest respect and gratitude.'"

...Why conceal it. "If my so-called 'extreme Psychological Heredity' manifested solely in such fashion among the mentally ill, there would be scant cause for astonishment or concern." To be sure, even research of this caliber might constitute a discovery so monumental for those swarming tadpole scholars that their eyeballs would invert themselves—yet for myself, Dr. Masaki the Madman now addressing you, it amounts to no greater novelty than a crippled beggar attempting his first dash.

"The primary reason I so vehemently proclaim the terrors of Psychological Heredity is that its manifestations are not limited to the mentally ill in this manner. Ordinary people—that is to say, you gentlemen and myself—it can be clearly proven that Psychological Heredity manifests in us just as frequently as it does in the mentally ill." "...What." "A question... No." "Wait a moment, pray." "The meaning of your question is perfectly clear... Then wouldn't the distinction between the mentally ill and ordinary people become indistinguishable?" "You're probably thinking... 'What absurd nonsense is this?'"

However, from the standpoint of a pure scientist, there was no way to respond except to declare that such an absurd notion "existed"—which was precisely the problem. Moreover, this was far from being merely equivalent in degree to what was observed in the mentally ill. In our psychological lives—we of course included you all—there existed Psychological Heredity indistinguishable from that seen in the mentally ill... or rather, something even more monstrous than that. It operated from dawn till dusk without a single minute or second’s respite... manifesting as dreams even during sleep, obsessively dominating our psyches—this was the problem. Because of this, there were exceedingly many cases where one’s own mind did not remain under one’s own control—which was precisely the problem. As a result, newspapers and magazines became endlessly supplied with social articles, making it impossible to avoid addressing the problem any longer.

...This was something I mentioned briefly to a newspaper reporter long ago—though it remains an exceedingly simple example within Psychological Heredity—where the saying “Even those without seven quirks have forty-eight” serves as an excellent illustration of how, just like psychiatric patients, one’s own feelings cannot be freely controlled. Moreover, that one cannot cease such behavior—no matter how derisively others might mock it, nor how urgently one feels compelled to reform—was precisely because this constitutes what we now term a manifestation of Psychological Heredity.... Even when resolved not to weep, tears come unbidden. Even when convinced a situation warrants no anger, should unbidden rage surge forth and obliterate all sense of context—this too stems from inheriting a disposition from some ancestor that renders one incapable of rectifying temporary mental imbalances... which undeniably constitutes a manifestation of Psychological Heredity—and therein lies the crux.

Beyond these—obsessive tendencies, fickleness, capriciousness, mercurial moods, forgetfulness, nervousness, such-and-such hobbies, such-and-such manias, such-and-such addictions, womanizing, philandering, perverse psychologies—when all such examples were exhaustively enumerated, there was not a single person among a hundred or a thousand who did not possess some degree of abnormal mental tendencies. Because there was no one not governed by Psychological Heredity, it became a serious issue. This principle grew all the clearer if one read the thesis I had written long ago titled *Fetal Dreams*, but in essence, what we called the human spirit or soul was nothing more than an infinite and boundless collection of various animal psychologies and folk psychologies inherited from one’s ancestral line of animals and humans. We wrapped its surface with what passed for a single layer of human skin—feeble rationalizations like “If I do this they’ll laugh” or “If caught it’ll be disastrous”—then bound it over with tapes labeled ethics, morals, laws, and customs; decorated it with assorted ribbons and tags reading social graces, courtesy, status, and personality; slathered on another layer of makeup and grease; then brandished parasols and walking sticks while declaring, “If you are a gentleman, then I too am a gentleman.” “If you’re a lady, then I too am a gentlewoman.” “If you’re human, then I’m human too”—so went the logic of those so-called ordinary people… or rather, they were none other than cultured individuals who strutted down main streets in broad daylight, shoulders squared as if cleaving through the wind itself.

However, this packaging of culture-bound individuals—laden with affectations—remained perpetually strained to its limit, striving to contain the base intensity and wanton contents of their Psychological Heredity. In their desperate struggle, ordinary people—stealthily snatching moments to catch their breath while maintaining appearances in public and feigning ignorance—found that when it became utterly unbearable, there were instances where it all came crashing down in some critical moment. In individuals, it became tantrums, digressions, brawls, killings, fraud, theft, adultery, and other immoral acts; when the rupture proved irreparable, they became mentally ill. Among the masses, it became riots, wars, pernicious ideologies, and decadent trends. Examples of such exposure of Psychological Heredity were shown in daily newspapers to the point of tedium.

I dare assert... that you gentlemen and I alike live in psychological states but fifty steps removed from a hundred steps of madness. The inability to distinguish between ordinary people and the mentally ill mirrors our incapacity to differentiate between good and evil in those imprisoned versus those walking free. Thus has Earth's surface throughout all ages existed precisely as a "Grand Liberation Therapy Field for Madmen"—Kyushu University's facility being but its miniature replica. As proof, do not its very patients—like you sirs and ourselves—vigorously manifest Psychological Heredity while vehemently insisting 'I'm no lunatic!'... and...

“Ha ha ha ha ha... How about it, gentlemen? Aren’t you growing even slightly indignant?” “What? ...Not angry? ...How admirable.” “Ah, you gentlemen are veritable paragons of common sense.” “Ladies and gentlemen fully worthy of representing modern culture... Eh?” “What was that...?” “No—that’s not it.” “Since your opponent is the Madman Doctor, you haven’t been listening in earnest from the beginning...? ...Ughah.” “Well now, this is beyond compare.” “When common sense has advanced to such a degree, I stand utterly defeated.” “Very well.” “If such be your stance, I too shall steel myself accordingly.” “From time immemorial, scientific inquiry has claimed shameless effrontery and discourteous conduct as its essential nature.”

“With your kind permission, I shall now take the liberty of exposing your naked shame through more immediate examples and most earnestly endeavor to provoke your anger.” “I presume this is something you’ve all experienced: when your mind grows slightly foggy, various fantasies and hallucinations begin surfacing one after another.” “Now these so-called fantasies and hallucinations are none other than phantoms of Psychological Heredity. To explain this academically: when the brain’s reflexive interaction functions grow fatigued and stagnant, various unrestrained elements of Psychological Heredity—having severed their connection to reason and common sense—undoubtedly commence running amok through the body’s reflexive interaction systems, each vying to act out their self-indulgent somnambulisms first. Take for instance a woman behind paper screens, idly folding laundry while pondering her past and future—before she knows it, her thoughts drift into unbounded territories: ‘What if I shoplifted that ring from the department store… if no one noticed…’ or ‘If my husband died now and left his fortune, I could live such an exciting life with that nice man…’ or ‘How satisfying it’d be to torture that hateful wretch to death…’ or ‘If I slipped Mother-in-law some cat-repelling herbs…’ or ‘What if I committed love suicide with that actor…’ or ‘Maybe I should just become a vampire…’ and so on.” “As for men—a man gazes out the train window while yawning languidly… imagining what expression that gentleman would make if he slapped his cheek… how beautifully the town would burn if set ablaze from windward, reduced to a sea of flames.” “How exhilarating it would be to cut down that crowd in one sweeping strike.” “They go on vividly painting these preposterous scenes before their very eyes—what if someone hurled dynamite into that pottery shop… shattered that policeman’s shin… scattered that goldfish vendor’s wares across the tram tracks… took that young lady as his mistress… slipped that bank vault into his pocket… and so forth.” “Then they suddenly snap back to their senses and blush in solitary embarrassment.”

All these—the cruelty, combativeness, bestiality, and perverse psychologies that our ancestral generations desperately wanted to act out yet endured in silence—now take turns manifesting in modern forms within our consciousness. Those who claim "such things don't exist" are merely thick-skulled simpletons lacking self-awareness, or incompetent fools who've forgotten what little they once known. The proof lies in observing how even a single instance of such somnambulistic psychology, when excessively intensified, ascends to the level of mental abnormality. Just as one might drool unwittingly while engrossed in a novel’s most lurid scene, vividly picturing its imagery within their mind—so too, within the mentally ill patient’s exhausted reflexive interaction functions, such genetic psychology somnambulistically manifests with far greater intensity and gravity than their actual emotions or sensations… while simultaneously, nearly all other aspects of consciousness are erased, compelling them to execute those somnambulistic impulses with deadly earnestness. Therefore, their every action and deed come to align precisely with the feelings passed down from each of their ancestors. It comes to precisely and perfectly align with my theory.

Three thousand years removed from the present moment. Three thousand ri distant from there. In India, under the Bodhi tree in Buddhagaya, where the great sage Shakyamuni Buddha—having clarified the true nature of the three times: past, present, and future, and attained supreme perfect enlightenment—declared "Karmic Retribution," it is precisely this matter he spoke of there. "The parent’s karma is visited upon the child… Ahh… How fitting…" "AHAHAHAHAHAHA!" "This is no ossified scripture." "No need for coin offerings or ritual tosses." "This constitutes a lecture on Mental Science—the newest and most cutting-edge discipline within modern science." "This explains the terrifying mental existence you gentlemen routinely experience in your daily lives."

“However, gentlemen.” “It’s still too early to be shocked.” “The principles of Mental Science are providing facts far more terrifying—facts that shock the eyes and startle the heart—than you can imagine.” By now, through what had been explained thus far, you must have largely come to understand. The changing of human generations was akin to us falling asleep and waking again. You would think that after a night’s sleep, yesterday’s matters would be cleanly forgotten—but upon rising, almost unconsciously, the carpenter went to continue building the house he had begun yesterday, and the plasterer likewise went to continue coating yesterday’s wall. Then they recalled yesterday’s events again... “Ah! Yesterday I dropped a ten-sen coin there...” or “Right around this time yesterday, a beautiful woman passed by over there...”—and so at that same hour as yesterday, they began looking around restlessly there just as before, or became dazed.

The heredity of the mind followed the same principle… parents were yesterday’s self, children tomorrow’s self. Night was the time when today’s self was born from yesterday’s self—a dark, unconscious state of gestation. Therefore, regardless of gender, when humans encountered what were called stimuli—scenes, objects, seasons, weather conditions, and such where their ancestors had once experienced such moods or mental states—they returned to bygone psychological states, just as present-day carpenters and plasterers did... Moreover, the psychological traits inherited through generations in this manner were far from few in number! Moreover, such scenes, objects, weather conditions, and other elements that ought to serve as psychological stimuli were utterly plastered across our surroundings—ceaselessly stimulating our Psychological Heredity night and day, never resting for a single moment or instant as far as the eye could see or the ear could hear—terrifying, I declared. The “Ushitora no Konjin” that governed our lives was none other than this principle of “Psychological Heredity”—I declared! I would present astonishing proof before long… mark my words!

“AHAHAHAHA! “Do not mistake this for the Ōmoto sect’s Ofudesaki scriptures.” We confront here an utterly mundane fact of daily existence. Our psyches shift and churn ceaselessly from dawn till dusk—setting out purposefully only to become entangled in festival night stalls… abandoning travel preparations to skulk through library stacks… lovers recoiling at the altar’s edge… spurning hard-won employment with a postcard’s flick—all because infinite stimuli ceaselessly govern Psychological Heredity. That we remain oblivious stems from these stimulus-heredity interactions being too fleeting, too nuanced, too devastatingly intricate.

“……Now then… How about it, gentlemen? If we were to study the relationship between such stimuli and Psychological Heredity more deeply and scientifically—don’t you think we could perform all manner of fascinating pranks? Just as one observes experiments in physics or chemistry—doesn’t it seem possible to induce precisely desired changes in another’s mind?” “To give a familiar example: human criminal psychology was often subjected to unexpectedly intense stimulation through what appeared utterly trivial… or entirely unrelated stimuli… For instance: staring at a pen tip stained red until one felt an inexplicable urge to stab the eyes of an actress’s photograph lying beside it… gazing at blue skies or white walls until suddenly overcome with cruel urges… seeing fog outside a window and wanting to clean a pistol… hearing howling winds and craving to walk with a dagger tucked in one’s robe… glimpsing a sharp razor and smirking while comparing it to one’s own face in the mirror… watching a woman’s smiling face as she joked ‘You can kill me if you want’ in bed and genuinely resolving to murder her… or a songbird’s chirp drifting into the parlor—sparking illicit emotions between two hitherto earnest lovers… and so on.” “When we observed such shifts in feeling—utterly devoid of rational explanation—they undeniably manifested Psychological Heredity; moreover, every single instance constituted nothing less than the remarkable first sprouting of immense criminal psychology.”

Or when reading old *kōdan* tales, essays, legends, records and such—stories abound where someone started uttering strange things after viewing a ghostly hanging scroll their ancestors had warned against looking at; or where one’s countenance changed while unsheathing a prohibited family heirloom sword… This occurred because such tales demonstrated the terrifying power of Psychological Heredity’s stimuli through tangible objects anyone could comprehend—indeed, my investigative records contained mountains of such examples.

Now then, if one were able to scientifically study the terrifying effects of such stimuli and then vigorously apply them in practice—what would happen? Could it not become possible that phantom arts surpassing even those of Inuyama Dōsetsu, Ishikawa Goemon, Tenjiku Tokubei, and Jiraiya might be performed in modern times? Even without reaching such heights, skillfully utilizing this type of suggestion enables one to drive others to madness upon first encounter. Like some clumsily applied modern scientific weapon—making no sound nor spilling blood—it wouldn't rouse suspicion even from passersby in broad daylight. If even the greatest detectives of our age came rushing, they'd find no clues to such crimes... No—what if these acts are being vigorously committed around us at this very moment?

“Heh heh heh... There’s no need to stiffen up and readjust your sitting position like that. Even though I am a master of mental science, I have yet to discover a method to drive all of you gentlemen in this hall into simultaneous madness through suggestions from this screen. Admittedly, I do think it would be fascinating if one could accomplish such a thing... Hah hah hah...”

"No, this is a joke—but such criminal methods have already transcended the realms of fantasy and conjecture to become a present-day reality." "Facts always exist prior to research… and were I to declare such a thing, I might feel compelled to moisten my brow pensively."

But do not be alarmed. Indeed, within the draft of my esteemed friend Dr. Wakabayashi Kyōtarō—Dean of the Kyushu Imperial University Medical School—titled *Crimes Utilizing Mental Science and Their Evidentiary Traces*, such lamentations stood arrayed as an introductory essay. Just that very introduction had been sent to me for proofreading, so I took the liberty of skimming through it—and this was its tenor… It declared…

――According to my investigations and research, one must recognize that this category of crime has in fact been perpetrated since antiquity. For instance: among those transmitting traditions of esoteric Buddhism and Onmyōdō—such as En no Gyōja, Abe no Seimei, and Kūkai—as well as Shingon adepts, Shugendō ascetics, prayer masters, ritual proxies, shrine maidens, and others serving deities or Buddha-like entities under appellations like “such-and-such sect” or “such-and-such divinity,” there exist individuals who through accumulated experience have orally transmitted mental scientific suggestive techniques. These they apply to women, children, or uneducated and benighted men—those with underdeveloped intellect and reason—inflicting alterations or injuries upon mental faculties while wantonly exploiting them for gain. This corresponds to what has been traditionally termed “employing fox spirits,” “casting secret Shingon curses,” or “summoning living or dead specters.” “Acts resembling divine retributions from gods and buddhas—miracles, thaumaturgies, ascetic feats—are not absolutely impossible even from Mental Science’s perspective. When one discerns evidence of higher-order techniques—hypnotism, spiritualism, necromancy—being actively employed by their practitioners who wield extraordinary influence in civilization’s underbelly, within the occult substratum of crimes too bizarre and elusive to apprehend, it proves difficult to dismiss them all as mere rationalized chicanery——”

――Even in present-day Japan, one could hardly assert that victims of such criminal acts did not exist among those confined in psychiatric hospitals, admitted to vagrant shelters, or mentally disturbed individuals wandering the streets. However, as it remained nearly impossible at present to rationally investigate these cases and apprehend the perpetrators, concrete examples proved difficult to enumerate. For when employing such means to psychologically harm individuals, not only did they leave not a trace of physical evidence―as seen in other criminal methods―such as a single drop of blood, a momentary sound, or even a wisp of smoke, but the victims themselves immediately lost all capacity to provide testimony; simultaneously, restoring their mental abnormalities required considerable time―or they might never recover at all―and even should they recover, grave doubts persisted regarding whether any recollection of the victimization or residual memory of the criminal method remained―making it inevitable that investigations would encounter extreme difficulties―this outcome being hardly beyond anticipation――

In my view, modern culture is what is called a culture of materialist science. Therefore, it is only natural that the types of crimes committed therein must also predominantly apply the principles of materialist science. Once the various principles of Mental Science reach widespread acceptance as general knowledge, it goes without saying that crimes applying these principles will similarly demonstrate prolific prevalence; moreover, the terror and trembling deserved by such criminal acts shall undeniably surpass those of modern so-called crimes applying materialist science—this too remains a self-evident truth. And in the face of such crimes, how are we forensic scientists to investigate these offenses and study their murderous implements? By what foundational knowledge should one illuminate the criminal pathways and clarify the substance of their methods——et cetera——

“……How about it, gentlemen? My esteemed forensic scientist colleague Dr. Wakabayashi Kyōtarō was researching ‘crimes utilizing Mental Science’ that would soon become a global epidemic—scouring for concrete examples with flea-catcher’s scrutiny to preemptively curb this outbreak. Despite psychiatric patients and suicides who appeared to be victims of such crimes swarming across the earth’s surface, he continued enduring every manner of hardship and anguish while faced with the tragic reality that genuine research could not be published due to the absence of suggestive materials or other evidence that might serve as clues to the crimes. And so he persisted in suspecting that even the slightest details of every human gesture—posture, gaze, hand movement, manner of speech—might constitute crimes utilizing Mental Science.”

……But here’s the thing……. ……How about it… gentlemen…. Here before us lay an astonishing research material that had rolled into my hands... To be precise, it had been none other than Dr. Wakabayashi Kyōtarō who first discovered this specimen—he had concluded it must be an unprecedented “crime utilizing Mental Science” and had been investigating it accordingly—yet as reference material for my so-called Psychological Heredity, its value proved indescribably magnificent. Moreover, having been lured into it and carelessly meddling had proved my undoing—even I, in all my prowess, had been driven to purchase a one-way ticket to the realm of ten trillion Buddha-lands and flee bare and penniless—such had been the sheer terror of this research material. ……Not only the true nature of the monstrous suggestive materials that drove its madness, but also the grotesque and heartrending circumstances surrounding the onset of its somnambulism, governed by Psychological Heredity... An investigative record of such staggering scale had fallen into my hands—one so meticulously complete that not a single detail was lacking, down to the minutiae of Psychological Heredity’s inner workings, which felt as pleasant as a heart oozing away in dissolution. Truly, something that defied classification as a national treasure or world treasure... A work of extreme scientific rigor and thoroughgoing romanticism, containing over 120% eroticism, grotesquerie, and nonsense... Exhibiting the grandeur of an unprecedented, ultra-special masterpiece in scale and the profundity of its narrative... It stood truly... beyond all description...

“Ahahaha.” “Ah, my apologies!” “Understood, understood… Cease your applause, if you please.” “Merely lining up adjectives proved insufficient.” “You see, when alcohol runs low, one’s reflex-sympathetic functions grow sluggish.” “Pardon me—I’ll have them sound the trumpet of the King of Kings.” “And while we’re at it, let’s have a Havana ring blown… Oh dear… This won’t do.” “Am I still standing before the lectern?” I promptly retired from within the screen and assumed the narrator’s role while projecting details of that bizarre incident. Then—with one stroke—shattered your common sense into motes…

……What…? You’re saying that even if I step outside the screen, it’s all the same…?… Gah! This has thrown another curveball. Too much cleverness becomes a nuisance, eh?……In truth, before long another me would emerge within this silver screen to stage a live performance—applying the contents of that supremely grotesque Psychological Heredity incident to a “liberation therapy” experiment. Therefore, at that moment—being that other me—I absolutely had to step out from behind the projection screen and take up the role of narrator; otherwise, it simply wouldn’t do. This wasn’t some Futurist theater piece, you see….

"...Presenting with utmost solemnity K.C.MASARKEY Company's ultra-special production titled *Madman's Liberation Therapy*—of course being this season's premiere in natural color, embossed relief, and talking picture format—wherein all performers apply their own lived experiences through documentary realism... Centered upon a peerless beautiful youth and an incomparably beautiful maiden, amidst whirling enigmas that birth greater mysteries, terrors that escalate into marvels, the blood and flesh and souls of over twenty men and women—emerging from nowhere and everywhere—become entangled in a swirling mandala pattern, until at last within this 'Madman Liberation Therapy Field,' they approach that razor's-edge climax poised to announce—or perhaps withhold—a conclusion too ghastly, too cruel, too blindingly horrific to behold... We humbly entreat your fullest anticipation...[Fade to black]..."

[Subtitle] Suspect in the bizarre incident involving the strangulation of two women—his biological mother and fiancée: Kure Ichirou (born November 20, 1907). Filmed October 19, 1926 at the Liberation Therapy Field for Madmen, affiliated with the Psychiatry Department of Kyushu Imperial University――

[Explanation] First and foremost, I shall now present the young protagonist of this incident... Namely, among the ten madmen previously shown as a preliminary glimpse, this was a full-frontal close-up of the youth who had been observing the elderly man tilling the field. As indicated in the subtitle, his name was Kure Ichirou, and that year he was twenty years old—but as you could see, he was a beautiful boy so fresh-faced that even men would have felt compelled to gaze at him.

Now, prior to proceeding to discuss the details of this incident, if I were to state why we have presented to your view the protagonist’s face in such a close-up manner, there is no other reason. It is because this youth’s physiognomy holds a significant relationship with the Psychological Heredity that governs the very foundation of this incident.

As you are aware, physiognomy cannot yet be termed a pure science at present; however, since certain aspects of it have indeed been confirmed to align with reality, Dr. Masaki—whenever observing the face of a new psychiatric patient—meticulously researches their bone structure and tirelessly investigates what racial characteristics have intermixed within their blood. In other words, the psychological heredity of all human beings manifests both the characteristics of their immediate individual ancestors and—simultaneously—the psychological traits of various ethnic groups that intermingled from all directions during ancient, barbaric, uncivilized eras. Thus, even when broadly speaking of "Japan," within its physiognomy and character exist the visages and temperaments of ethnic groups such as Mongol, Indian, Malay, Jewish, Latin, Ainu, and Slavic peoples—bound together through inextricable causal relationships to create each individual's features. ...That is to say, human physiognomy must be considered a microcosm of one’s ancestral lineage... while an individual’s character should be regarded as a congealed aggregate of their forebears’ mental lives across generations. Taking such points into account, it becomes imperative for research to identify not only a person’s superficial traits but also their latent character—unknown even to themselves—and correlate these with their state of madness... When dog enthusiasts or horse enthusiasts can—with but a glance at an animal’s features, coat, or skeletal structure in the marketplace—pinpoint its lineage, temperament, habits, and even hidden proclivities as though tracing constellations... this is merely an application of the same principle to animals. Dr. Masaki has long maintained an unshakable conviction: unless future detective methodologies and forensic research penetrate to this depth of analysis, they shall remain fundamentally fraudulent.

Now then, by anatomically explaining this youth’s physiognomy based on Dr. Masaki’s diagnostic notes and contrasting it with the features of the horrific incident we would subsequently expose, anyone would first notice that this youth’s complexion appeared excessively pale for a Japanese person. As could be observed, while the faint rosiness in his cheeks—evidence of his retained virginity—might be set aside, the translucent milky-white hue flowing beneath the Japanese-specific healthy tone in his skin clearly suggested an admixture of Caucasian blood within this youth’s lineage… Moreover… If this held true, one might conjecture—based on ancestral records to be presented later—that blood from the so-called Hu people, who had crossed the Tian Shan Mountains and entered Chinese regions at least over a thousand years prior, had resurfaced in this youth’s physiognomy in modern times…

Next, within this youth’s physiognomy, that which purely represented the Mongoloid lineage consisted solely of the neat black hairline and the internal shape of the nasal cavity. The youth’s nostrils were rather straight—when examined through an instrument, one could see straight through to their depths... You must not laugh. This constituted an essential investigation genetically speaking, for had they been nostrils descended from Caucasian lineage, they would indeed have been terribly twisted.

Now then... upon closely observing this youth’s physiognomy with the aforementioned Mongoloid lineage characteristics excluded, one discovered there a conglomeration of all manner of various non-Mongoloid ethnic lineages. First...the overall shape of the face was an ovoid with the fullness characteristic of Latin lineage, but the eyebrows and eyelashes—thick and long as if painted with a brush—and the area around the eyes appearing vaguely bluish were unmistakably Ainu in style. Furthermore, the external shape of the nose was purely Grecian in form, and when one observed the parabolic curve from cheek to jawline combined with small, thin lips that undulated distinctly, it evoked the Aryan stylistic techniques preserved in ancient Buddhist statues of our country... Please observe closely. At the center of his somewhat slender jawline lay a Nordic-style indentation… what we might call “if cheek dimples are rubies, jaw dimples are diamonds”—aesthetic features rather unnecessary for a man… yet as you could observe, they became markedly clearer when he smiled…

Now then, when one examines the physiognomy of each individual human in this manner and compares them with that human’s characteristics, they correspond remarkably well. Among these, what aligns most precisely are proclivities, followed by inclinations, then talents in that order... That is to say, this youth simultaneously possesses Japanese-style docility, Ainu-style reverence, and Latin-lineage intellect—yet these traits... As you may infer from his languid blinking manner—remain unmanifested on the surface due to being enveloped by a Nordic-style reclusive elegance of indeterminate origin. ……In short, this youth should be regarded as possessing a calm and quiet disposition relative to his age.

However, when such a superficially calm character was suddenly shattered and overturned by the suggestion of Psychological Heredity, the unimaginably tenacious, profound, and ferociously cruel blood of continental ethnic lineage—which had until then lurked and flowed within him—abruptly leapt forth to perform utterly mystifying feats. Thus, the truth of the unprecedented bizarre incident we shall now present may simply be considered as the Mongoloid lineage’s Psychological Heredity—hidden within this youth’s nasal cavity—erupting all at once.

Furthermore, within this youth’s physiognomy, there remained something crucial that must not be overlooked. This jawline—while embodying an extremely optimistic and carefree aspect that became immediately impassioned at minor stimuli or environmental changes, erupting into indiscriminate laughter, tears, or rage—in short, possessed a pure Latin-type slender structure symbolizing a mercurial French-like temperament. Yet this characteristic too appeared scarcely manifest in the youth’s ordinary demeanor. These traits seemed suppressed by the extraordinarily clear intellect previously described and a reclusive disposition that shunned human interaction. Nevertheless, given their pronounced nature, Dr. Masaki had awaited with anticipation—ever since this youth entered the liberation therapy field—the inevitable emergence of this jawline’s latent character… whether sentimental or passionate… during prolonged episodes of Psychological Heredity or their convalescent phases.

Having explained the above, I trust you have largely come to understand the physiognomy of this youth named Kure Ichirou. When considering how the divine creator could combine characteristics of such diverse racial lineages into one form—with such exquisitely elegant symmetry and pure, sublime harmony—it becomes truly unnerving... Even we who earn our bread under banners proclaiming scientific authority and human intellectual progress can only hold our breath, swallow our voices, and bow our heads when confronted with this awe-inspiring masterpiece of living art.

Next came how events centered on this youth’s psychological heredity entered Dr. Masaki’s field of vision through such an outlandish plot... Ah—no— I shall now explain—in accordance with precisely rotating film reels—the sequence by which these events became imprinted upon two ocular lenses and earlobe microphones attached to what this doctor dubbed his “cranial camera obscura for natural color stereoscopic sound films.” ...[Fade to black]

[Subtitle] Strange Occurrences in the Corpse Dissection Room of the Forensic Medicine Department at Kyushu Imperial University... Filmed on the Night of April 26, 1926―― [Explanation] The film now displayed before your eyes was, as you could see, utterly indecipherable from corner to corner—impossible to discern where was where or what was what. It was a scene as dark as lacquer. Therefore being impossible to offer explanation, we nevertheless entreated you to observe closely. In the upper-left corner of that screen—so utterly black it might have been mistaken for satin, velvet, or a crow’s plumage on a moonless night—there drifted a cluster of faint bluish glimmers like fireflies arranged in irregular rings, barely visible to perceive. ……That proved to be matter from the stomach of a geisha who had recently committed suicide using the widely prevalent Nekoirasu rat poison, emitting phosphorescence from within its glass dish.

If you have discerned that, then I trust the wise among you have sufficiently surmised this darkness to be no ordinary darkness. ...That is to say, this darkness constituted a scene observed through a gap in the boards—from within a ceiling crawlspace accessed via the storage room beneath the adjacent staircase—capturing the nocturnal state of the corpse dissection room located in a corner of Kyushu Imperial University's Forensic Medicine Department.

This ceiling peephole had long served as a vantage point for janitors gripped by Dehagame-like voyeuristic impulses or reporters driven by curiosity to clandestinely observe corpse dissections. Its considerable age was evidenced by Y-shaped gouges—expanded through nails or knives—along the aperture’s inner edge. With but a slight adjustment of one’s viewing angle, one could survey every corner of the room’s lower half as though reaching out to touch them… Moreover, though somewhat cramped, stretching one’s legs upon the storage shelves allowed for rest far more comfortable than riding third-class train accommodations—truly most convenient… As for that phosphorescent unclean dish emitting its glow, it was actually placed upon a desk in the opposite corner; appearing thus in the film’s upper frame due to having been captured from directly overhead.

It goes without saying that what was present within this room was not limited to that single dish. Moreover, as the armored shutters on both windows and the entrance door were firmly locked, the darkness within this room had grown so profound that beyond the faint phosphorescence of that filth being barely discernible, nothing whatsoever could be detected. In the deathly silence—punctuated by a hiss like boiling water somewhere—Dr. Masaki's "natural color, embossed relief, talking picture" film flowed on, as black as lacquer and as stealthily as the passage of time... fifty feet... a hundred feet... two hundred feet... three hundred feet........

...Now, what necessity could have compelled Dr. Masaki to haul that dual-eared, dual-eyed natural color, embossed relief, talking picture camera obscura—with such Herculean effort—into this dissection room’s ceiling crawlspace? Under what purpose had he persisted in gazing—no, filming—such a trivial dark scene endlessly, tirelessly? For a man of his stature as a distinguished university professor to debase himself in these rodent-like endeavors—what a grotesque spectacle!... You ladies and gentlemen must surely find this perplexing, but I shall omit further explanation here, as it will become self-evident in due course.

......The time was approximately 10:00 PM on April 26, 1926... A scene unfolding roughly twenty hours after the eruption of the bizarre incident centered on Kure Ichirou's Psychological Heredity... The film continued sliding silently onward, still pitch-black throughout... Five hundred feet... eight hundred feet... one thousand feet... fifteen hundred feet... The screen's stillness and pitch-blackness remained unchanged from before, save for that phosphorescent glow from the filth growing increasingly pale and distinct... At that very moment, the sound of a clock striking from the faraway janitor's room within this building enveloping the classroom resonated muffledly... One... Two... Three... BONG... BONG... BONG... BONG... BONGBONGBONGBONG............ BOO——OOO——NNN.......

As the clock finished its eleventh strike, within the pitch-black darkness came a heavy thud like the slamming shut of a large wooden box. Immediately after, a brilliant light burst forth, making everything shimmer and sway with a glare so intense it dazzled the eyes. This occurred because someone—who had apparently been holding their breath within this room all along—turned on, one after another, four 200-candlepower bulbs hanging near the chamber's center, as you could plainly observe... but upon closer inspection...

……Oh…… How utterly ominous the spectacle within that room was……. First and foremost seizing the eye was the dissection table at the room’s center, partitioned into an oval shape and emitting an eerie, cadaverous glow. This table had originally been fashioned from pristine white marble; yet over time, the blood, fat, and grime from countless corpses laid upon it had gradually seeped into the stone’s pores, transforming it into this sepulchral hue.

Upon that dissection table lay a black U-shaped wooden pillow near which stood a tall cylindrical nickel-plated hot water heater positioned to the left of the screen - its glare dazzling enough to make one's eyes water. This might have been a specially ordered item; thread-like wisps of steam seeping from countless windows of its cylindrical tower - resembling either a massive European medieval monastery or prison model - created a spectacle sufficiently unearthly to evoke scenes beyond mortal realms. Then another object... something that might escape immediate notice yet would gradually imprint itself as strangely conspicuous - lay against the wall beneath the right-hand window: an oblong crate of considerable size covered by white drapery. That shroud left no doubt - this could be nothing but a coffin housing remains. To speak of coffins in dissection rooms names an inevitable pairing verging on tautology, yet what rendered this combination peculiarly arresting was likely its covering - white silk emitting an aristocratic sheen suggesting considerable expense... This digression aside, such opulent coffins being brought into forensic chambers remains practically unheard of; typically one finds crude pine boxes marked with chalk numerals at best.

The reflections from those three uncanny objects—the dissection table, hot water heater, and white coffin—were encircled on all sides by a multitude of shadows cast by test tubes, retorts, beakers, flasks, large bottles, small bottles, blades, and more... Amidst these lay scattered machines and instruments of gold, silver, white, and black in sundry shapes and postures... From floor to desk edges to shelves swarmed glass basins and dark brown ceramic jars—purple, brown, milky-white, or colorless—in teeming profusion. The gray of human flesh heaped within, the cobalt of bones, the sepia of blood... all these emitted a dazzling... cold... stabbing, slashing, gouging radiance—their aberrant projections composing a symphony that seeped into the flesh as silence....

And… behold… near the center of this spectacle, between the white-silk-shrouded coffin and the white marble dissection table, rose abruptly the jet-black figure of a grotesque being—its head, face, and torso entirely swathed in ash-gray rubber cloth, hands clad in double-layered black silk gloves over rubber, legs sheathed in colossal rubber boots like those worn by Arctic fishermen… yet within this shroud, only the eye sockets were outlined in yellow within transparent celluloid—a visage as ominous as a demon devouring corpses’ hearts… or a black butterfly larva lurking in thickets magnified ten-thousandfold in eeriness… Not least, its astonishing height—effortlessly reaching to twist the switches of bulbs suspended so high above… If I have stated this, then you ladies and gentlemen must have inferred it by now. This grotesque figure was none other than Dr. Wakabayashi Kyōtarō—the world’s first discoverer of the renowned “Blood-Based Parentage Identification Method” and, simultaneously, the foremost authority in modern forensic medicine currently drafting an unprecedented masterpiece titled *Crimes Through Applied Mental Science and Their Evidential Traces*.

The renowned forensic scholar Dr. Wakabayashi Kyōtarō—having surreptitiously entered this dissection room approximately twenty hours after the eruption of the unprecedented grand criminal incident in psychoscience centered on Kure Ichirou’s Psychological Heredity—had completed these imposing preparations and now awaited the clock’s hands to point toward eleven o’clock…the hour when night-duty physicians and on-call janitors would have fallen into slumber…a circumstance discernible from present conditions. But observe these illuminated electric lights! Well now, ladies and gentlemen! Here yet another strange fact manifests itself—have you not taken notice?

The state of this room's interior contained not a single element that wasn't bizarre to a first-time observer—as you can plainly see. "There exists nothing here that isn't eerie... or so it may strike you," one might say. Yet based on what you had observed thus far, I trust you had sufficiently deduced matters such as 'Dr. Wakabayashi must be preparing to commence some manner of work at the dissection table' or 'the corpse serving as material for said work likely lies within that coffin.'

However... if that were indeed the case, what could explain the absence of any person in this room who ought to serve as Dr. Wakabayashi's assistant? In autopsies of this nature, it had become nearly an established norm that one or two individuals would typically be present as witnesses in some capacity... Yet despite this convention, as you can plainly observe, Dr. Wakabayashi had allowed no such individuals into the chamber. From this circumstance—though the reason remained unclear—we must infer he found himself compelled to undertake a certain grave and highly clandestine task tonight entirely alone... No... When considering how both doors flanking the dissection table had been left unlocked, their keys still in the locks, there could be no doubt of it. One could clearly deduce that tonight's work must involve extraordinary secrets—wholly distinct from the autopsies or inquests performed on corpses from ordinary cases...

...As these thoughts arose, Dr. Wakabayashi—who had gone to the washbasin in the corner of the room and meticulously washed his gloved hands—now slowly bent his body, removed the white shroud covering the coffin, opened the thick white wooden lid of a coffin rarely seen in such a room, and extracted from within it the corpse of an elaborately dressed girl. To those of you who have been following the preceding explanations, I trust you have by now largely surmised this young woman’s identity.

This young woman was none other than the bride-to-be of Kure Ichirou—protagonist of the present case as previously introduced—whose nuptial rites had reached the very cusp of being solemnized; her name being Kure Moyoko. She stood as a peerless beauty who had attained seventeen years of age that very year. This Kure Ichirou—now formally betrothed—served as the peerless beautiful youth starring in K.C. MASAKEY Corporation's supreme masterpiece *Madness Liberation Therapy*, a psychoscientific film transcending eras and rationality itself. His counterpart—the ace leading actress destined to jointly manifest every permutation of psychoscientific eerie beauty and visceral terror—had thus temporarily assumed the form of a coffin-bound corpse to make her inaugural appearance before you all.

A waistcoat in the crescent moon color popular that year featured a spring haze so dazzling to the eyes and was embroidered with five-needle pine motifs. A purple-ground long-sleeved kimono of habutae silk embroidered with a thousand-crane hem pattern—stiffened with starch still intact and worn inside out—lay triple-layered upon her form, while a thick obi sash of gold and silver brocade thread, seemingly fresh from the tailor’s workshop, had been wound into a cylindrical bundle. All had been placed within an unpainted wooden coffin… an uncanny beauty tinged with heartrending poignancy. Not only did the extraordinary nature of this case become apparent through these details, but one could also perceive the sentiments of those who had arranged this corpse within its coffin—a revelation that left one’s chest inexplicably constricted.

However, Dr. Wakabayashi—who appeared to have entered a psychological state embodying academic rigor—showed not the slightest concern for such matters. With an air of dismissing sartorial decorum, he carelessly grabbed and removed the waistcoat, obi sash, and triple-layered long-sleeved kimono before shoving them beside the coffin—revealing beneath a face veiled in plain silk; pristine upper arms with prayer-folded wrists bound in white cotton; a crimson yuzen-dyed underkimono; a scarlet dappled sash; blazing red crepe undergarments; white ankles sheathed in white tabi socks... These elements—juxtaposed against the dissection room's coldly arrayed instruments of brutality—created an indescribable grotesquerie and allure as they were cradled in black-clad arms and drawn beneath blazing electric lights. Most strikingly horrific yet pitiful was the thick makeup and lipstick remaining disheveled across the girl's face—her long glossy black hair drawn back limply as she lay with eyes tightly closed. And then... oh... behold that.

Around the made-up collar area of the neck clustered vivid livid spots—the traces of strangulation… ligature marks layered in mottled purples and reds… Having quietly laid the body upon the marble dissection table, Dr. Wakabayashi—that black-garbed grotesque figure—showed no mercy as he untied the white cotton bindings from the prayer-folded wrists, unfastened the scarlet dappled sash, and forcefully pulled open the chest of the underkimono. True to his reputation as the field's acknowledged authority, Dr. Wakabayashi conducted an exhaustive examination of the girl's entire body—pure as flawless crystal—with consummate skill. Upon completing this task, he momentarily relaxed his shoulders in apparent relief before crossing his arms loftily and standing motionless as a jet-black iron statue, gazing fixedly down at the girl's corpse.

...What could Dr. Wakabayashi in black attire—facing this peerlessly beautiful girl’s corpse alone in such a place at this late hour—possibly be contemplating? Could he be agonizing over reexamining the cruel and bizarre circumstances surrounding her death before the corpse, striving to focus his uniquely penetrating and razor-sharp observations? Or might this corpse’s display of a ghastly beauty and profound allure—unprecedented in this dissection room’s history—have even this lifelong bachelor devoted to academia unwittingly transfixed, entranced by some ineffable emotion? No, no... Such imaginings would constitute grounds for losing respect toward Dr. Wakabayashi’s strict and meticulous usual character, so I shall refrain from delving any deeper.

...And then... presently, Dr. Wakabayashi—suddenly regaining awareness with a start—scanned the supposedly empty room. He thrust his hand into the right pocket of his black attire, seeming to search for something, but soon approached the coffin as if struck by recollection. From beneath the exquisitely piled garments, he extracted a single black trumpet-shaped tube resembling a child's toy in size. This was an antique monaural stethoscope rarely used by modern physicians—more effective than contemporary rubber-tube models for detecting minute internal acoustics within the human body. Dr. Wakabayashi pressed the trumpet-shaped end beneath the left breast of the girl's corpse, then held the opposite end against his ear beneath the mask, focusing every auditory nerve with absolute concentration.

He listened to the corpse’s heartbeat. Oh… what a bizarre deed this was that Dr. Wakabayashi had performed! The chests of those watching instead pounded with such dread that… But look here. Dr. Wakabayashi remained pressing the antique stethoscope to his ear while retrieving a large silver pocket watch from beneath his dissection gown with one hand and stared at it intently... Indeed, the sound of a heartbeat could be heard. In other words, the young woman’s body upon this dissection table must have still been alive…… To recall—when Dr. Wakabayashi had previously conducted a full-body examination of her, the faint bluish lividity that should inevitably have manifested in a corpse having passed considerable time post-mortem had shown no trace anywhere…… Nor had there been signs of rigor mortis observed—from which one might surmise that this young woman had already been…… No— It could be surmised that she had not died even before being placed in that coffin. Around the neck remained distinct ligature marks—traces of strangulation—still preserved...

……What a mysterious event this could be……. However, Dr. Wakabayashi showed no particular sign of surprise. Presently removing the stethoscope from his ear, he thrust it along with the watch into his vest pocket, then—appearing thoroughly satisfied—nodded two or three large nods while gazing anew at the girl’s form. From this demeanor, one might infer that Dr. Wakabayashi had discerned as early as his initial examination of this girl’s corpse that she had entered a state of suspended animation—a phenomenon deemed medically extraordinary. Of course, this must have occurred after nearby physicians and police doctors—who likely rushed there earlier—had conducted sufficient examinations; nevertheless, upon what points did he focus to confirm it was suspended animation? Moreover, under what pretext was this suspended animation body packed into such a coffin and brought into this room...? Furthermore, what reason and purpose could there be for manipulating this bizarre girl’s suspended animation body in utter secrecy, all alone in this manner? There may be no means to inquire, but given that this concerns the eminent forensic scholar Dr. Wakabayashi Kyōtarō, he had already exhaustively researched examples of suspended animation from all eras and regions. Thus, the fact that he alone must keep absolutely secret the truth of this girl’s corpse being in suspended animation—this necessity must have been confirmed by Dr. Wakabayashi Kyōtarō himself as some grave reason indispensable for resolving this unprecedented bizarre incident.

But that was not all. ...This black-garbed grotesque figure—Dr. Wakabayashi in disguise—had been lurking in the darkness earlier, quietly opened the lid of his coffin, and while applying some unique stimulative method of his own to rouse this girl from suspended animation, periodically monitored her heart sounds with a stethoscope—a fact that could be ascertained beyond doubt. ...For that clattering sound made by Dr. Wakabayashi's black-garbed figure just moments earlier—before hearing the eleven o'clock chime and switching on the electric lights—must undoubtedly have been the sound of him closing the coffin lid, which would mean the stethoscope too had been left beneath the clothing at that very moment. ...Yet simultaneously—though an exceedingly trivial matter—the fact that he would forget such an essential tool of his trade appeared truly unexpected when considered against Dr. Wakabayashi’s ordinarily supremely calm and meticulous character, proving beyond doubt that tonight he existed in a psychological state markedly different from his norm. Was it not amply inferable from this single incident alone how utterly absorbed Dr. Wakabayashi had been—how he had struggled and labored in darkness to summon this girl back to life in this world?

However, the fact that Dr. Wakabayashi's skills were of such extraordinary and fearsome caliber would only become fully apparent in due course—what had been revealed thus far was merely the opening act. Upon realizing that the girl on the dissection table was awakening moment by moment from her state of suspended animation, Dr. Wakabayashi removed both gloves with an exceedingly tense demeanor. He thrust his hands into the pockets of Western-style trousers that bulged perfectly round beneath his dissection gown, extracting various items one after another while arranging them on the nearby wooden desk. A bottle of white hair dye and a bamboo toothbrush. Three or four new brushes. A small ink canister. A compact containing rouge and lipstick. Skin lotion. Perfumed oil. Cream. Various types of face powder... and so on. All were items utterly unbefitting such a room... Then opening a brown paper package concealed deep within the shelf near the entrance, he extracted an assortment of entirely new items—a white cotton kimono with white flannel tube sleeves, a cheap Hakata-obi sash, a Miyako undergarment, a white nurse’s uniform and cap, a full set of bands, slippers, a nurse’s cap, hairpins—which he likewise arranged upon the nearby wooden desk. All these items had been prepared since daytime, and while one might think they were intended for dressing the girl on the dissection table, the reason for such action remained unascertained.

Next, Dr. Wakabayashi once again took out the stethoscope and meticulously listened to the girl’s heartbeat anew. Then, retrieving a small brown bottle from the medicine shelf across the room, he tilted his face slightly away as he dripped the colorless transparent liquid inside onto a piece of absorbent cotton. He slowly brought it toward the nose of the girl, where traces of face powder still remained, while gently taking her pulse with his left hand. It went without saying that this was anesthetic being administered... Complications would arise should the girl awaken too quickly. Yet what exactly Dr. Wakabayashi intended by keeping her anesthetized... such matters remained unclear at present, leaving his actions to multiply and grow increasingly bizarre in appearance...

...In the midst of these thoughts, Dr. Wakabayashi—having finished administering the anesthetic—fastened the still-exposed chest of the girl, then briskly strode toward the medicine shelf ahead. From its corner, he retrieved a single Mino-style ledger bound in the Japanese tradition. The cover bore the large regular-script inscription "CORPSE LEDGER... KYUSHU IMPERIAL UNIVERSITY MEDICAL DEPARTMENT". Upon opening this cover, one found each page filled with rows of entries titled "Corpse Number", "Date Received", "Recipient Address & Name", "Date Released", and similar categories, each entry stamped above and below with an inspection seal reading "Wakabayashi". ...Now, having flipped through nearly half the ledger to the last remaining written page, Dr. Wakabayashi pressed his finger against the penultimate corpse number—"414"—and container number "7." He then tossed the ledger onto the nearby desk and, stretching out his long arms, switched off all four 200-candlepower bulbs above his head.

The room returned to its original state of utter darkness, so it was.

Moreover, this film’s state of utter darkness transitions exactly as it is into the utter darkness of other rooms—but what manner of darkness lies in wait for the film’s future path, one might well ask……【BLACKOUT】

...The reel of utter darkness continued unspooling before your eyes... ten shaku... fifteen shaku... thirty shaku... fifty shaku... Within the congealing core of darkness hardening before your gaze, a small yellow light bulb—dim and grimy—soon flickered to life. As you can see, a gloomy indoor scene viewed through some keyhole appeared.

Good heavens, ladies and gentlemen... Have you ever laid eyes upon such a room?

The dark concrete staircase visible on the right indicated that this room was a basement, so the dozen or so large white-painted drawers lined up at the front were all indeed containers for corpses. In other words, this room was a corpse refrigeration chamber under the responsible management of the Dean of Kyushu Imperial University's Medical Department; even in the midday heat of midsummer, it maintained a temperature so low it made one's flesh prickle with goosebumps. But particularly now, in the dead of night, the eerie silence was such that one might have almost suspected they could hear the breathing of the dead...

The black-garbed figure who now manifested there—none other than Dean of Medicine Dr. Wakabayashi in disguise—seemingly struck by the chamber's frigid air, continued coughing with such violent paroxysms that he appeared near collapse for some time; yet having at length suppressed this fit through great effort, he removed from his pocket a master key and detached the sturdy padlock affixed to corpse container number "7". Then, with a rumbling noise, he pulled out the sturdy wheeled container onto an available platform, but without pausing to catch his breath, he leaned his upper body forward and dragged down the rigid corpse of a girl—her entire body wrapped in bandages like a pole—onto the floor with a sliding sound. Upon inspection, this rigid corpse bore a dark-complexioned, ugly countenance wholly dissimilar to the previously seen girl in suspended animation; yet in aspects such as approximate age, height, build, and hairline configuration, they appeared curiously alike.

Dr. Wakabayashi—who had clearly marked this corpse for attention beforehand—without thorough examination or the slightest hesitation, restored the container precisely to its original position and attached the padlock. Then he hoisted the corpse like a log or some such burden and ascended the concrete stairs step by step, all while switching off the wall-mounted switch with one hand and extinguishing the basement lights.

【BLACKOUT】

There once more continued a scene of utter darkness—but... pray lend me your ears. That cacophony of dogs barking... This was the moment when wild dogs in experimental cages near the pine grove—stretching behind both the corpse refrigeration chamber and forensic medicine classroom—discovered Dr. Wakabayashi's grotesque figure stealthily carrying a corpse through pitch-black shadows, sending them into furious barks. The shrieking cries of nightmare-tormented apes... Even typically placid sheep and chickens awoke to screech and squawk at full volume. That clamorous darkness... the sheer terror of it... Yet as such animal uproars occurred nearly every night, not a soul found it suspicious. Who could have imagined these creatures were proclaiming an unprecedented bizarre incident—the eminent Medical Dean secretly absconding with a corpse under his own custodial responsibility? The spring night's darkness enveloping Kyushu Imperial University's campus, amid dreadful animal shrieks and cries, only deepened into utter stillness.

Before one could even register that those voices had gradually faded away and silence had fallen completely, the four 200-candlepower electric lights snapped on once more, and the scene returned to where it had been before—the forensic medicine dissection table. There lay the rigid corpse of Girl No. 414 upon the concrete floor, while Dr. Wakabayashi—having now securely relocked the entrance door as before—stood motionless before the dissection table, panting heavily beneath his black mask as he repeatedly dabbed at his sweat.

Thus, on the night of April 27, 1926, within the dissection room of Kyushu Imperial University’s Department of Forensic Medicine, two young female bodies came to be laid out side by side. The girl beginning to revive beautifully and the girl rigidly stiffened in ugliness… And above all, the body of the girl laid out upon the dissection table in red Yuzen fabric had remarkably regained her complexion in a mere short while; under anesthesia, she had begun faint, shallow breaths—so much so that one could discern the rise and fall of her ample bosom. That extraordinary serenity, that seductive allure... Perhaps because they stood in such stark contrast to the ugly face of the girl beneath the table, her beauty appeared all the more vivid—radiant to an almost unnerving degree.

Dr. Wakabayashi took hold of her pulse and began checking the anesthesia's effectiveness while glaring at the second hand of his watch. As his jet-black figure stood motionless with head slightly tilted like a stone statue, the room's emptiness became filled with an indescribable silence akin to a thousand-shaku-deep burial pit. Having discarded the girl's wrist and pocketed his watch, Dr. Wakabayashi gently lifted her body to lay it on a coffin lid in the corner. He then hoisted the rigid corpse of Girl No. 414 onto the dissection table, fitting a weathered U-shaped wooden headrest beneath her skull. Seizing large silver shears, he began snipping through the bandages swathing her entire body, stripping them away one by one—but look! Those livid scars crisscrossing from back to chest to thighs...the welts of beatings, burns, abrasions...those brown-black-violet streaks now glared under blazing light alongside vivid lividity at her waist—so lifelike in color and form they seemed ready to crawl across her flesh as snakes, lizards, and toads.

As some of you may already be aware, cadavers of this type were frequently brought into universities and specialized schools across the nation for anatomical research purposes. In particular, those admitted to Kyushu Imperial University spanned various categories prevalent in the region: individuals abducted and abused in coal mines, textile mills, other factories, or dens of iniquity; suicides; vagrants; and others. Among these, it was not uncommon to find those with no claimants. The university took all such specimens as research material to dissect exhaustively before cremating them in the university-affiliated crematorium, reducing them to bones that were then delivered to bereaved families with a 5-yen condolence offering. Furthermore, as it had been established that those without claimants were buried in the communal burial ground with an annual memorial service performed, this corpse too was considered to be one of such category.

As I describe this, Dr. Wakabayashi—having swiftly completed his examination of the corpse’s entire body—let out another deep, hoarse sigh that seemed to wheeze from his lungs, wiping sweat from his face through the mask. He then approached the washbasin in the corner of the room, gulped water directly from the faucet only to choke on it, drank again after steadying his breathing, and remained for some time coughing with labored, intermittent breaths. For Dr. Wakabayashi, long afflicted by tuberculosis and weakened by years of decline, such strenuous labor must have been excruciating, cutting to the very bone.

However, Dr. Wakabayashi's work—emerging from the uncanny only to plunge into further uncanny—had not yet progressed even halfway. Before long, Dr. Wakabayashi returned from the washbasin area. First he placed a large bowl at the corpse's feet, inserted into it the hose attached to the faucet there, and began releasing water across the dissection table surface from the corpse's legs toward its back. He then prepared another bowl of hot water, and using a sponge and soap, meticulously washed the girl's mutilated corpse on the dissection table from corner to corner. After thoroughly drying every inch of her skin with gauze and absorbent cotton, he parted her sparse reddish-brown hair down the middle, seized one of the gleaming scalpels at hand, and in one motion stabbed the corpse between the eyebrows... then proceeded to cut open the scalp in a straight line from there to the back of the head with a sawing motion.

Now, those of you with even a modicum of knowledge in this field must surely have thought 'Oh?' at this point. Dr. Wakabayashi’s methodology here deviated from the standard procedure for cadaver dissection—which typically progresses from the chest and abdomen to the head, followed by the back—by commencing directly with the head… No sooner could one question under what purpose Dr. Wakabayashi—renowned forensic pathologist of past and present—had begun wielding his scalpel in such capricious sequence... than Corpse No.414's scalp was deftly flipped inside out like a reversed glove, its hair pulled down below both eyes in one fluid motion akin to peeling off a sock. Next, having sawed through the exposed white shaven scalp in a headband-shaped incision, Dr. Wakabayashi extracted the brain matter emerging beneath using scissors with dexterous hands onto a glass dish. One might have expected him to then conduct his signature meticulous examination or perhaps preserve it as a specimen... Yet contrary to such assumptions, he handled the cerebral matter on the dish with the indifference of someone flipping a beefsteak or omelet—twisting it midair before carelessly reinserting it into the original cranial cavity. He capped the skull, flipped the skin and hair back over it, then rapidly manipulated needle and thread to crudely suture everything together.

...This was unexpected. An act verging on desecration. As one gaped in suspicion—why would Dr. Wakabayashi, that paragon of rigor, conduct such appallingly slipshod dissection tonight?—the corpse soon... thudded face-down... whereupon scar-corded muscles flanking the spinal column were rent open with a circular scalpel's grinding bite. The doctor plunged a bifurcated saw into the cavity, excised bilateral ribs, split the extracted spine lengthwise without proper examination, then crudely sutured it all together with a thick needle stabbed through repeatedly. This slapdash brutality mirrored his prior methods exactly...

Next, Dr. Wakabayashi laid the corpse supine once more, briskly cleansing the soiled areas before attempting to gauge the abdominal skin's thickness... In what felt like an instant, he seized a glistening new scalpel and plunged it straight into the throat... Advancing the blade from between the breasts to the epigastric abdomen... rotating leftward at the navel... then descending in one fluid motion to the pubic bone... Upon detaching the sternal cartilage and removing the breastbone, he skillfully manipulated both hands to open from the chest wall downward to the abdominal wall—yet with a single stroke, both abdominal wall and peritoneum were simultaneously incised, leaving the internal organs entirely unmarred. ...The sight of these visceral organs arranged with stark clarity—glistening wetly under a pallid glow—might one call it eerie, or perhaps describe it as terrifying?... The black contamination spreading across one lung's surface revealed this girl's labor in coal mines, while the liver rupture and internal hemorrhage—appearing as direct causes of death—testified to how violently she had endured abuse or persecution. Yet Dr. Wakabayashi remained as ever, paying no heed to such matters. He merely rotated and roughly agitated each visceral organ at random, and after concluding all pretense of examination by perfunctorily slicing open the stomach, large and small intestines, and bladder—without taking tissue samples from each organ as in standard dissection—he once again took up a thick needle and hemp thread, proceeding to suture from lower abdomen to pharynx... Yet... the decisively cruel brutality of his blade work... the astonishing dexterity in his needle handling... and the unbearably acrid tremor of satisfaction manifest in his gestures... were such that one might suspect this to be the very expression of a mentally deranged individual gratifying some profound violent desire through such labor....

Ladies and gentlemen who have been closely observing every one of these actions from the beginning must by now have clearly realized— Dr. Wakabayashi’s demeanor had now completely shed its usual composure and dignified bearing, transforming him into what seemed almost another person—a man driven by cruelty, ruthlessness, and a peculiar fascination, now brimming with sinister vitality… However, this is by no means a phenomenon to be regarded with suspicion. History abounds with examples of human beings dubbed masters, virtuosos, or geniuses who—upon becoming engrossed in their work—enter psychological states utterly divorced from their usual selves through abnormal excitement born of fatigue and delusions conjured by supernatural acuity of nerves, developing morbid fascination with seemingly nonsensical matters or performing bizarre and grotesque acts with chilling nonchalance... How much more so then for a man of Dr. Wakabayashi’s singular constitution and intellect? Having just completed the occult subtlety of resurrecting a peerless beauty from suspended animation within darkness, he now undertakes this unprecedented operation—a frenzy of mutilation upon a girl’s horribly abused corpse—so abnormally excessive that the degree of neural excitation and psychological distortion occurring within him must lie utterly beyond ordinary imagination.

Enveloped in such inscrutable psychology… Having thus completed suturing the girl’s chest and abdomen up to the pharynx, Dr. Wakabayashi finally seized an exceptionally sharp small scalpel and turned his attention to the face of Girl No. 414. First, he thrust the scalpel forcefully into the edge of the right eye and twisted out both eyeballs in a circular motion as if conducting his signature toxicology reaction test—yet as usual, without examining the retinas, he immediately shoved them back into their original sockets. Next, he split the nasal bridge down the middle with a grating motion, cleaving it to the depth where the inner mucous membrane became visible. Then he sliced both corners of the lips all the way to near the ears and wrenched off the jaw with a sickening crack until the pharynx lay exposed.

The corpse's face had been deformed into something unrecognizably inhuman through these procedures, but the black-clad giant—having now sutured each section back to its original state—allowed himself not a moment's respite; seizing gauze and a sponge soaked liberally with alcohol, he meticulously wiped every soiled area until there materialized before him a singularly bizarre corpse whose countenance had altered so completely that none could discern who it once was.

The black-clad doctor finally let out a breath there, repeatedly comparing the bodies of the two girls lying atop and beneath the dissection table, until at last he discarded both layers of his double gloves. Dissolving solid face powder from the nearby desk in his palm while taking care not to spill a single drop, he began applying makeup to Girl No. 414’s face, both shoulders, arms, and everything below her waist. ……Now, observe that technique. How about that? Observe how delicately those fingers work—taking utmost care to prevent powder from settling in coarse sutures or along hairline margins—does this not demonstrate a technique perfected through extensive experience with such cosmetics?

Could this perhaps stem from the doctor having repeatedly transformed his own countenance through countless disguises? Or might his shadowed psyche—where insatiable perverse appetites merged with forensic obsessions—have long swelled into an archaic fixation resembling those ancient Egyptian morticians who adorned mummies, now laid bare through this macabre opportunity? Regardless, his technique of cloaking livid abuse scars—those bluish-black and brownish fatal discolorations—with whetstone powder, repeatedly smoothing cadaverous wrinkles and bandage marks while layering white makeup, proved astonishingly deft—a skill perhaps acquired from brothel matrons versed in concealing courtesans' diseased blemishes... until at last he'd painted the dark, lacerated girl's flesh to match the fair complexion of her pristine counterpart. He then took up lipstick, rouge, eyebrow ink, and powder in succession, replicating even the subtlest chromatic variations across every body part—dyeing each mole to mirror the model exactly—before comparing each strand of hair against the girl below with barber-surpassing precision, finally anointing every section with fragrant oils.

……No sooner had he thought this than he opened a nearby desk drawer, took out red, blue, purple, and other aniline dyes for microscopy onto a plum-blossom-shaped palette, and—dabbing lightly with a new brush while blending them—began staining the strangulation marks around the neck to match the color and form of the real thing down to the millimeter. Yet even this was executed with such consummate skill and precision that raised earthworm-like swellings and lizard-esque bloodstains seemed to encircle the neck before one’s very eyes.

However, the dark figure’s sinister work appeared far from concluded.

The dark figure then hurriedly pulled back on his double-layered gloves and retrieved a bundle of bandages from beneath the desk. He used those bandages to swathe the made-up corpse’s face and head in pure white, then proceeded to wrap the neck, shoulders, upper arms, chest, abdomen, and both legs in sequence until—coiling round and round and round—the entire body took on an appearance resembling either a botched mummy or a naked teru-teru-bozu doll crafted by a child. Then he stripped off the gaudy undergarments from the beautiful girl lying atop the coffin lid, dressed the white-shrouded figure in them, and tightly wound a scarlet-dappled obi over it—but the strangeness of that sight, its absurdity… and now, confronting it, the black-clad figure gazing down with a newly conspicuous, portentous eeriness…

However, on the teru-teru-bozu-like corpse, the hands with prominent joints—dry and rough—remained jutting out stiffly. As I watched how he would camouflage this, I thought—truly, this was the work of that unparalleled genius, the black-clad doctor. It required no special effort—he bent both arms at the elbows with audible cracks, pressed the palms together in precise prayer position, and bound them tightly with white cotton cloth. I see.

Even as he thought this should suffice, he forcibly crammed the cracked heels—similarly left exposed with no way to conceal them—into the beautiful girl's small tabi socks and snugly fastened the clasps. Having at last fully stiffened, he hefted up the alluringly shaped white-shrouded figure with effort, gently lowered it into the coffin, dressed it upside-down in a three-layered furisode and hitatare vest, and wound it tightly with a silk brocade obi—whereupon he then cleansed every remaining corner of the dissection table surface with copious amounts of sponge, hot water, cold water, soap, and alcohol. Then he gently lifted the nude form of the beautiful girl—now on the verge of regaining consciousness—and snugly positioned the thick coffin lid that had served as her base atop the teru-teru-bozu-like figure. Finally, he completely enveloped everything in a white silk shroud.

However, the dark figure’s sinister work still remained. Moreover, this time—if one might call it so—was the truly monstrous undertaking that would demonstrate the most sinister of sinister skills within his sinister skills. There, rigidly standing between the coffin and dissection table, the black-clad giant—having once more heaved his shoulders in a sigh and caught his breath—soon hurriedly discarded his gloves. He then seized a pair of scissors and, parting the girl’s long, luxuriant locks splayed across the dissection table, snipped off a fistful of hair near the center with a decisive snip. He neatly wrapped it in Japanese paper retrieved from the desk drawer, aligned it beside the earlier corpse ledger alongside printed copies of the corpse examination report and two or three stationery items drawn from the same drawer. Then, pulling the iron round stool closer, he picked up a new brush, dipped it in ink, and reverently inscribed “Lock of Hair” and “Miss Kure Moyoko” atop the paper-wrapped bundle. He then appeared to check his watch while deep in thought, but seemingly resolved to postpone annotating the corpse examination report, quietly shifting it aside. When he opened the corpse ledger, he carefully tore out a page near the center marked “No.414...7” along with its adjacent entries and removed it entirely.

He then dissolved ink on a separate dish, creating various shades while proceeding to write over a dozen entries for corpses—names, dates, numbers—in handwriting matching the torn pages exactly... yet... among these, he omitted all documentation related to the current "No.414...7," instead entering details for the subsequent "No.423...4," stamping each entry methodically with his "Wakabayashi" official seal. ……Thus, all entries concerning the disguised corpse of the girl who had just been placed into the coffin were now completely expunged from this corpse ledger.

...Ladies and gentlemen, you must by now have fully comprehended—in its dreadful entirety—the significance behind each of Dr. Wakabayashi’s meticulously grotesque labors up to this juncture… The exquisite maiden serving as Kure Moyoko’s surrogate—now entombed within that coffin—was in truth the mutilated corpse of an anonymous vagrant girl devoid of kin or provenance, her remains belonging to that wretched class which none would dream of claiming unless formally summoned by our institution—a fact readily deducible to discerning minds.

Now regarding individuals whose relatives underwent cadaver dissection at our institution—while notifications were typically issued for bone remains to be collected the following day—in truth immediately upon dissection’s completion laborers from our university’s dedicated crematorium in the rear pine grove received the body. Without any witnesses present they reduced it to ashes through cremation then handed over only bone fragments and preserved locks of hair to whoever came to collect them… This system—wholly distinct from ordinary cremation practices—operated purely on institutional trust making apprehension about corpse substitution not one concern in ten thousand. Admittedly we cannot categorically assert that no distraught parents arrived before cremation demanding to see the deceased’s face one final time—but even were such a case to occur had they been shown her haphazardly sutured visage there would almost certainly have been no blood relative capable of recognizing it at second glance.

However, the sole concern here lay in the possibility that officials from that department or related physicians might return for a precautionary re-examination—but how could they possibly detect this substituted corpse, crafted with such double- and triple-layered care through ingenious and meticulous handiwork? In any case, given that this was the work of Dr. Wakabayashi—a man renowned throughout the land for both his character and reputation—who had utilized his authority as Dean of Kyushu University’s Medical Department to execute it with such excessive meticulousness, who could have found any flaw? Where could any oversight have lain?... By the time Kyushu University’s corpse refrigeration chamber disappearance incident—left only to a single attending physician besides Dr. Wakabayashi, who tilted his head in lingering suspicion—was consigned from eternal darkness into deeper obscurity, the murdered girl’s vanished corpse would already have been reduced to a mere fragment of white bone, interred beneath an imposing grave where incense and flowers were being offered.

Simultaneously now, I must inform you that the girl upon the dissection table regaining her breath—the beauty named Kure Moyoko—having been expunged from family registries to become a living ghost, would begin breathing while clutched within the pale, towering Dr. Wakabayashi's grasp; yet what purpose this would serve hereafter, and to what end the doctor had reduced this girl to a living ghost, remained unclear. I would have preferred to save that explanation for later enjoyment… but in truth, even Dr. Masaki—who had been observing from the ceiling up to that point—remained utterly clueless… so I imagine you too must share in this bewilderment… however….

...Yet simultaneously, ladies and gentlemen—regarding both the case details that Dr. Wakabayashi Kyōtarō, that peerless possessor of an astonishing intellect even lauded in newspapers as a “labyrinth-breaker,” now challenges through such grueling efforts and unconventional tricks... and regarding how utterly bizarre and unfathomable—how overwhelmingly horrific—the criminal’s mind must be... I trust you have already formed expectations tenfold—nay, twelvefold—concerning these facts. Moreover, rest assured that the astonishing substance of this case—so worthy of your expectations—along with its concrete procedural details shall unfold sequentially before your very eyes in but a short while...

As you can plainly see, the case had already fallen entirely into the hands of that dark figure within Kyushu Imperial University’s Department of Forensic Medicine dissection room—Dr. Wakabayashi. And now, Dr. Wakabayashi—devoting his generation’s intellect and vigor—was making ready for battle against the shadowy mastermind behind this bizarre incident he himself had set into motion… Having thus completed rewriting the corpse ledger, Dr. Wakabayashi tossed it carelessly onto the desk alongside the unmarked autopsy reports. Heaving his exhausted frame upright, he collected every last scrap of gauze, every sponge and cotton ball scattered about the room, bundling them with stationery and cosmetics into fresh bleached cloth before securing the package tightly with bandages. This was likely part of his scheme to secretly dispose of the evidence and keep tonight’s work utterly concealed. One might reasonably conclude that his failure to collect tissue samples from Corpse No.414’s various regions stemmed from this very rationale.

Having completed these tasks and thoroughly inspected the area once more, Dr. Wakabayashi picked up the new nurse uniform and white cotton kimono placed on the nearby desk and approached the dissection table to dress the girl still unconscious from anesthesia... but... Dr. Wakabayashi involuntarily halted. He dropped the items he was holding and staggered backward. The overwhelming beauty of the girl’s entire form that now demanded wide-eyed awe… No—a pure radiance of life wholly unlike when she lay as a lifeless corpse moments ago now seemed to suffuse her entire being with each breath… Her cheeks… her lips… revived into the warm hue of blood, akin to fragrant flower petals… or perhaps to sweet, trembling jelly. Above all, those alluringly shaped breasts swelled with a vivid rose hue like the exposed meat of a great shellfish born in a land of mystery, beneath the blazing light, hinting at a mind betwixt dream and reality.

...Cold... portentous—the anesthetized form of a peerless beauty unlikely to ever be found again upon the marble slab of Kyushu Imperial University’s Department of Forensic Medicine Dissection Room... plump, undulating breaths at her pure chest that would compel all earthly beings to prostrate themselves... As if intoxicated by the fragrance of her breath, Dr. Wakabayashi feebly straightened up. Then, just as a feeble gasp—seemingly resonating with the girl’s breathing—began rippling across his black-clad shoulders, he leaned his upper body slowly forward and, with trembling strengthless fingertips, lifted the black shroud from her face up to her forehead.

Oh… the fearsomeness of that expression….

The elongated face that materialized under the white-hot light lay drenched in deathly pale sweat—exhausted and slackened like a corpse’s—standing in stark contrast to the girl upon the dissection table. Within those eyes blazed bloodshot traces of extreme exhaustion and agitation, akin to a fever patient’s glare. Upon his lips clung a crimson hue unseen among ordinary folk, desiccated with pathological aridity. Maintaining this visage—black hair plastered to his forehead, temples quivering rhythmically—he peered downward from within his black attire...

He remained motionless like this for some time. What was he thinking...? What was he trying to do...? It remained unclear... No sooner had a deep wrinkle formed beneath his right eye and begun to twitch than—in the blink of an eye—the convulsive ripples spread rhythmically across his entire face. It was unclear whether he was crying or laughing... Within his paper-white pallor, his crimson eyes began alternately opening and closing. As if rejoicing in something... his crimson-dried lips gaped open like a wolf's, and a pale, whitish tongue dangled limply from within. As if mocking some unseen entity……a face unimaginable even in dreams to those acquainted with the usually solemn, gentlemanly Dr. Wakabayashi……No—a demonic visage that manifested only when he found himself utterly alone……

But amidst this, he slowly raised his face. Pushing up the disheveled hair on his now-dry forehead with both hands, he raised his pale eyes and stared fixedly at the four electric bulbs blazing overhead.

His breathing once more gradually began to grow louder and more labored. A peculiar redness began gently suffusing his cheeks. Narrowing his eyes as if conversing with some unseen presence in the air, he produced a low, unpleasant sound from the depths of his belly in fragmented bursts, "...Ah... Ah... Ahaha..." He continued laughing... but soon bit his lip hard and looked down at the beautiful girl's sleeping face. Raising his trembling fingers, he switched off the lights above one by one—first... second... third...—before finally extinguishing the fourth with a snap.

However, the room did not return to its original darkness. From the slight gap in the closed window's armored shutters, the color of dawn streamed in whitely, rendering everything in the room bluish-green and transparent as though at the ocean floor. Blankly staring at that light, he soon pressed his trembling fingers tightly against his face. Staggering unsteadily, he reeled backward until his back hit the wall. Slumping down onto the floor just like that, he let both hands drop to the floor as if he had fainted, stretched out both legs, and hung his head limply.

At that moment, the lips of the girl on the dissection table began to twitch faintly. She let out a faint... dreamlike voice.

"...Dear Brother... where are..." [Fade to black.]

[Intertitle: The Meeting of Drs. Masaki and Wakabayashi.]

[Explanation:] Next to be projected was Dr. Masaki dozing in his office upstairs in the Kyushu Imperial University Department of Psychiatry Main Building. The time was May 2nd, Taisho 15... precisely one week after the scene of Dr. Wakabayashi's corpse substitution—as depicted in the previous film—had been recorded onto Dr. Masaki's natural-color embossed sound film reels; this occurred on a fine-weather afternoon. On the three-sided windows of the professor’s office, pine foliage bathed in intense sunlight shimmered dazzlingly, while the oppressive cries of early cicadas already resounded—yet across each south-facing window stretched a clear May sky the color of gofun-painted illustrations, beneath which a bright wind carried—one after another—the sounds of construction work from the liberation therapy field then under development.

In the center between the massive desk and large fireplace, Dr. Masaki sat perched in an enormous swivel armchair. In the fingers of his right hand—clad in a white examination gown—he held an extinguished cigar, while his left gripped that day’s newspaper. His nose glasses remained perched as he nodded off repeatedly. There he sat—the very image of some thump-thump quack doctor straight out of foreign comics—while we particularly enlarge and present to your view the back page of his half-read newspaper where the headline "Bride Killer Enters Labyrinth" blares forth in extra-large boldface type across three columns. Before long, the hands of the electric clock atop the large fireplace clicked as they pointed to 3:03, whereupon a university attendant in his forties—wearing a university-issued uniform with a neatly parted head of hair—entered holding a single name card and respectfully presented it before Dr. Masaki.

Dr. Masaki, who had been roused by the sound of the door closing, took the name card and, upon giving it a brief look, sunk both eyes in a thoroughly displeased manner.

"Naaah. No way. "No matter how many times I tell you, you don’t get it, you blockhead!" "There's a limit to your idiotic diligence!" "From now on, there’s no need to bring these things every single time. Just tell them to come right in without announcing themselves—say that!" As he said this, he tossed the name card onto the large desk. He was being quite pompous... then closed his eyes as he was and once again began dozing off.

At that moment, Dr. Wakabayashi—clutching a single blue merino cloth bundle with great care, his tall frame clad in a long frock coat—soundlessly glided in and settled into the small swivel chair facing Dr. Masaki. The sight of the diminutive Dr. Masaki sprawling out completely within a large chair, contrasted with the hulking Dr. Wakabayashi perched reverently hunched in a small chair, made for truly perfect comic material, I must say. ...then, as expected, Dr. Wakabayashi became caught in his habitual cough, pressing a white handkerchief to his mouth as he began hacking violently.

Dr. Masaki appeared to have finally awakened by the commotion, whereupon he thrust his newspaper and cigar aloft with a flourish before unleashing a monstrous yawn—one so vast it seemed ready to swallow not only Dr. Wakabayashi before his eyes, but the entire room, Kyushu University itself, and ultimately even his own being. Thus was the inaugural meeting between the two doctors following the incident’s outbreak inaugurated by this monumental yawn—yet though their ensuing conversation appears devoid of any superficial discord, should one discern how its undercurrents seethe with mutual acerbity, sparks flying to intimidate one another through utmost severity… then I trust this shall suffice for you to infer the vastness and profundity of the dark currents coursing through this affair’s hidden depths…….

“Ah… Aah… “No. “You finally came, huh? Hahahaha. I did think you’d show up around this time.” “Haa... Then you already know the details of the incident…” “Of course I know... This must be it... ‘Bride Killer Enters Labyrinth’... they say... Though naturally the article’s full of lies...” “That is correct… However, how did you come to know of my involvement in this incident…”

“...Naaah... When I called you the other day about some trifling matter, they said you’d canceled your afternoon lecture and dashed off somewhere by automobile—so I thought, ‘Ah, something’s afoot!’... Then that evening’s paper came out with some headline in extra-large boldface type across four columns... ‘Bride Strangled Night Before Wedding’ or some such... So I figured you’d gotten tangled up in this case... Simple deduction, really.” “I see. However, how did you come to know that I would be visiting here today…”

“Hmm... Well, I was certain you’d come right away—whether today or some other day.” “You see... this case... I’d had it pegged from the start as that Psychological Heredity business.” “The truth is, I was waiting for you to investigate thoroughly and bring it to me. Hahahaha.” “I’m obliged. As you’ve surmised... The truth is, I’ve been involved with this case for two years now...”

“What?!” “From two years prior...?” “That is correct...”

"...Hm――. "So there was another case like this two years ago?" "Yes―one where the same youth strangled his biological mother to death..." "Hmm... The same bastard... same method... his own mother... Hmm..." "The truth is I voluntarily involved myself in that prior case... This incident's true perpetrator lies elsewhere." "I maintained that this youth didn't commit the murder... yet the actual criminal remains unfound to this day."

“Even with your keen insight?” “...It shames me to admit this marks my first encounter with such an inscrutable case... How might I properly explain... While clear evidence of the crime exists, one might say there remains no trace of the perpetrator’s presence...” “Hmm――.” “Intriguing...” “...Thus even after the youth’s acquittal in the previous maternal strangulation case, I remained wholly unsettled. Resolving to identify the true culprit by any means necessary, I coordinated with both Yashiroko—the victim’s biological sister serving as the youth’s aunt—and police authorities, requesting immediate notification should any alteration occur in the youth’s daily conduct or personal affairs. Maintaining constant vigilance through these two years until today’s date, that very same youth has now indeed repeated the act—this time strangling Kure Moyoko, daughter of his aunt Yashiroko and his own betrothed, on their wedding’s eve. Consequently, it has been concluded that the maternal murder two years prior must likewise have been committed by this youth under identical psychopathic compulsions...” “As a result... my assertion from two years past that ‘another culprit killed this youth’s mother’... has now been utterly discredited...”

“Ahahahaha! Exhilarating… absolutely exhilarating! Now that’s what makes it interesting! Seems like the perfect case to test your mettle, doesn’t it?” “Oh, not at all… This transcends mere skill-testing… The truth is, I too have regarded this case as prime material for psychoscientific crime research—conducted under your esteemed guidance—and thus examined each matter from three or four angles through exhaustive investigations, compiling everything into comprehensive documentation… The contents of this cloth-wrapped bundle represent precisely those materials…”

“Whoa… That’s a monstrously huge pile you’ve got there… To think you’ve gathered this much in just a week since the case started…” “Ah no—this contains documents from the incident two years back too… As for the current case’s portion, I’ve been compiling notes around the clock as I investigate—so everything’s in order should I suddenly take a turn for the worse… Though this endless work has made my asthma flare up dreadfully… I fear what little time I have left grows ever more precarious.”

“Hmm…” "Come to think of it, you’ve grown remarkably gaunt of late." "You must take better care of yourself." "If a Mummy Hunter becomes mummified himself and transforms into a specter of mental science, we’ll have no means of pinning the duck." “Ahahahaha! Admirable dedication... Now then—what might that rigid square box perched atop your bundle be?” “Yes. This scroll served as the suggestive implement in the present Psychological Heredity case—the box being one I commissioned from a cabinetmaker.” "...We may conclude with certainty that Kure Ichirou developed psychiatric derangement after being shown this scroll by some party. Yet as I mentioned earlier, my assessment diverges entirely from that of the authorities—they maintain his condition constitutes either natural-onset psychosis or deliberate malingering, hence dismissing this scroll as evidentiary material with contemptuous laughter from the outset." “Though from another perspective, this very dismissal has conveniently delivered such invaluable reference materials into my possession...”

“Ahahahaha! That worked out nicely for you, didn’t it? With that unimpressive demeanor of yours, if you’d brought out such a scroll before those police and court officials, solemnly declaring ‘Behold—this is none other than the unprecedented new doctrine of Psychological Heredity from Dr. Masaki’s singular research, most august and sacrosanct material for suggestive experimentation!’… they’d have been utterly flabbergasted. You’re lucky they didn’t mistake you for a carnival quack, Ahahahahahaha!”

“Hahahaha. Oh no, in truth, I merely showed them the formalities to avoid that matter being concealed, but in reality, I found myself utterly unable to resist keeping it for myself…” "Indeed... You are a man who leaves no stone unturned..." “Oh… Not at all…” “...By the way, today’s business—you came to dump those documents and this case onto me, did you?” "Yes. That is indeed part of it, but there is another matter… I would like to request your psychiatric evaluation of the youth Kure Ichirou, who is currently regarded as the perpetrator of the bride’s murder and detained in Fukuoka Dotecho’s remand prison…"

“Hmm… “That boy?” “That boy’s mental state can be mostly understood through newspaper articles alone.” “What they call a post-episode amnesic state.” “In short—after developing mental derangement through some suggestion from that picture scroll or whatnot, he entered a somnambulistic state and killed the bride. Then, when they tried to forcibly restrain him to interrupt his somnambulism, he erupted into violent thrashing.” And due to extreme fatigue in his nerve cells from that agitation, all past memories predating the episode became suppressed and rendered inoperative. “In other words—‘retrograde amnesia.’ That much I can clearly ascertain just from reading the newspaper reports.” “It’s a common enough case—no particular need to summon me. You could’ve explained it yourself perfectly well.”

“Yes. You see... in this current case, my credibility has been overturned, and since my evaluations alone no longer hold weight, even the court appears to be at a loss... There are even suggestions that the youth Kure Ichirou might be a homicidal maniac... or so it seems...” “Hmm——.” “That’s utterly preposterous!” “For judicial officers to display such ignorance—amateurish though they may be—transcends all bounds of reason.” “First and foremost, isn’t it contemptible beyond measure that they believe this world contains some psychiatric entity called a ‘homicidal maniac’—treating people like fools?” “To immediately label someone a homicidal maniac simply because they’ve killed—that’s a more barbaric error than conflating manslaughter with premeditated murder!”

"That may be so..." “Exactly—you’ve surely noticed this long ago—what troubles me is how none of today’s scholars recognize that a patient’s words and actions before and after illness onset hold equal evidential power for psychiatric evaluation as a suspect’s behavior before and after a crime does for criminal investigation.” “The mentally ill—no matter how insane they may be called—never act in senselessly violent ways.” “Depending on the triggering stimulus that caused onset, the content of Psychological Heredity, and the depth of abnormal mental state, they proceed along rigorously logical paths through various diversions—with not an ounce of deception in the process—making their progression far more rational and orderly than traces left by ordinary crimes.” “Particularly when someone kills another person, the circumstances surrounding that heinous act before and after must be regarded as far more significant reference material than in ordinary crimes.”

“Most reasonable… This is the first I’ve heard of it.” “Because they don’t grasp this principle—when someone kills a person, they instantly brand them ‘homicidal maniacs’. Kill two people, and they become all the more certain of it.” “Now, judging purely by the outcome of murder, you might call them maniacs—but what if such a ‘maniac’ were to smash open a human head instead of breaking a thermometer?” “Ahahahaha!” “Any scholar who’d still label that a homicidal maniac deserves public ridicule… From a psychiatric patient’s perspective, all existence beyond themselves—whether human, animal, scenery, every phenomenon under heaven—appears as mere shadow puppets or moving pictures.” “For instance—should they desire red paint, smashing open someone’s skull becomes equivalent to shattering a red-alcohol thermometer in their mind.” “Once you comprehend their true aim was obtaining crimson liquid to paint blossoms, you’d never dream of applying labels like ‘homicidal maniac’.” “Thus through my eyes, this youth’s violence serves another purpose.” “To rephrase—it hinges entirely on what Psychological Heredity dominates his psyche.”

“Most reasonable… In truth, I too had thought it might be something along those lines—since this matter lies entirely outside my domain and within your esteemed purview, Professor—I have brought all related documents here for your reference. However… there remains one final point of doubt regarding this case that naturally falls under my responsibility, and it is precisely to seek your particular assistance on this matter that I have come to call upon you today…”

“Hmm——. Somehow this conversation has grown terribly tense, hasn’t it? What’s this ‘final point’ you mentioned…” “Yes… That would be the person who used this picture scroll to implant suggestions in Kure Ichirou…” “Ah… I see. If such a person exists, they’d be an extraordinarily innovative new-type criminal indeed. This clearly falls under your jurisdiction. Tracking them down would be…” “Precisely… However, as this single point remains utterly unclear at present, the entire case has been profoundly enveloped—from every corner to every crevice—within a mysterious cloud of obscurity…”

“Well of course it would be. Cases dominated by Psychological Heredity usually remain wrapped in a mysterious cloud and left unresolved—it’s been an auspicious precedent since ancient times, you see. Even just those that made the newspapers—there’s no telling how many there are.” “However… When I consider it, in this particular case there appears to be a possibility of piercing through that mysterious cloud… What I mean by that is nothing other than—” “As for that final point of doubt—it must lie buried deep within that youth’s memory…”

“Ah! Got it, got it. “Understood completely… In other words, if that youth’s mental state were restored, he would recall the face and appearance of whoever showed him that picture scroll… So you want me to conduct a psychiatric evaluation to unearth that memory—is that it?” “Indeed… I deeply apologize… but this matter lies entirely beyond my capabilities…” “No.” “Got it, got it.” “Understood completely.” “Truly worthy of the renowned forensic pathologist of our age!” “You’ve arrived at an excellent point… haven’t you?” “Hahahaha!” “Nah, I’ll take it.” “Indeed, I have accepted it.”

“Well… truly…” “Uh-huh. “Understood, understood.” “I’ve grasped everything.” “Now then—completely erase this case from your mind and leisurely take in some vitamins… Wait, speaking of vitamins—how about we head to Yoshizuka right now for some eel?” “Long time no drink… though I’ll be the only one partaking… Ah, never mind.” “As a token of appreciation for your work on this case…” “Yes, that’s most kind… However, when might we request your attendance for conducting the youth’s psychiatric evaluation?” “I will formally notify the court from my end, but…”

“Uh-huh.” “That guy’ll do.” “It’s no trouble at all.” “Just one look at that youth’s face tells me this is neither homicidal mania nor feigned madness.” “However, since there remains a need for detailed examination requiring hospitalization—and given that arrangements to bring him to this psychiatry department are already neatly settled—it’s all rather trivial.” “In stark contrast to Dr. Wakabayashi’s plummeting reputation, Masaki’s fame soars... Hahahahaha!”

“My apologies… Then what should be done with these documents?” “Ah… Oh right—wasn’t I supposed to take custody of that?” "Well, what should I do… Hmm." I had an idea. “Hand it over here... Throw it into this stove and close the lid like this. There’s no need to light a fire until this winter anyway. Not even Buddha-sama would notice... and here he comes...”

“Haa… What kind of voice was that?” “It’s not an impersonation. “It’s a passage from the Noh play Kanjinchō.” "For a forensic pathologist, you know absolutely nothing, huh." “Ah ha...!” ― [Dissolve to black] ― *Ohya ohya… Naaan’s kotttai…*

The natural color embossed talking motion pictures had finally become nothing but dialogue. This was no better than some shoddy radio or phonograph. Trying your hand at live film narration wasn't easy at all. Just tacking on honorifics like 'Your Excellency' every single time became such a bother. When you grew weary of it all and tried dropping those formalities... well, this mess ensued. Thoroughly exhausted by such nonsense, I decided to screen a film this time without any 'Your Excellency' nonsense—one requiring no explanation. No... Not merely 'no explanation required.' A 'screenless,' 'projectorless,' 'filmless'... In short, what you might call an 'utterly requirement-free movie'—something those antiquated German silent films could never hope to match! You ask what sorcery this could be? Simple enough: I'm presenting as 'film' those excerpted pages from Wakabayashi's investigation report—the one I tossed into that empty stove—which I later fished out, annotated with my own insights, and arranged sequentially... Sounds like dreadful work? Not at all! All it takes is slipping these excerpted originals into appropriate gaps within this last testament... *ahem*... You gentlemen need only read them to grasp everything... My latest invention—a trick film requiring nothing! Mark my words—this style of cinema will soon sweep the world! Should any takers appear... Why yes! Right this moment... One moment please.

To be honest, these excerpted records were something I had intended to include in my *Psychological Heredity Theory*, but while I had completely burned the manuscript of that thesis long ago, I specifically preserved this particular portion. By now, through what I had explained, you had splendidly become master detectives doubling as mental scientists; thus, should you read through these records with that faculty, thoroughly penetrating the truth of this incident until I'm forced to concede defeat would present no difficulty whatsoever.

...Through what eruption of *Psychological Heredity* did this incident come about? Does someone exist who deliberately detonated this *Psychological Heredity*—or not? Moreover, if such a person exists—where might they reside? And what manner of implications do Wakabayashi's and my own attitudes toward this case cast upon its resolution... if I may put it thus.

However, you’ll need to tighten your resolve and cinch your fundoshi real tight... After issuing such warnings, I plan to leisurely sip Scotch and puff on a Havana in the meantime… Hah…

◆Psychological Heredity Theory Appendix◆…………Various Case Studies

Case One: The Full Account of Kure Ichirou's Episodes

——Based on Mr. W’s Notes——

First Episode

◆First Reference: Kure Ichirou's Testimony

▼ Date/Time of Interview: Around 12:30 p.m., April 2, 1924 (Taisho 13). After the conclusion of the first seven-day Buddhist memorial service for the victim Chiyoko (36 years old)—mother of the same individual and proprietor of the women’s school listed below—

▼ Interview Location: 20-2 Hiyoshi-cho, Nogata Town, Kurate District, Fukuoka Prefecture—in the second-floor eight-tatami room serving as Kure Ichirou’s study and bedroom at Tsukushi Women’s School——

▼ Attendees: Kure Ichirou (18 years old)—biological son of victim Chiyoko; aunt Yashiroko (37 years old)—resident of 1586 Meinohama-machi, Sawara District, Fukuoka Prefecture, occupation: agriculture; the undersigned (Mr. W)——Total: three individuals—— “Thank you very much.” “Until you kindly asked me at that time, ‘What kind of dream were you having?’, I simply could not remember anything about that dream.” “Thanks to you, Dr. W, I was spared from becoming a parent killer.”

“If you could all just understand that I’m not the one who killed my mother—that alone would be more than enough for me.” “I have nothing to say.” “However, if it would assist your search for the culprit, please ask me anything.” “Since my mother passed without ever speaking of the distant past, I only know things from after I grew older—but I don’t believe there’s anything improper to share.”

“I was born at the end of Meiji 40 in Komazawa Village near Tokyo, or so I’ve been told. I know nothing about my father.” (A note states… There is reason to doubt the accuracy of Kure Ichirou’s stated birthplace. However, as this discrepancy presents no particular hindrance to academic research, it has not been corrected here.) “My mother had lived in Meinohama with this aunt since birth—or so I’ve been told. At seventeen, she left her aunt’s home to study painting and embroidery. Afterward, while searching for my father in Tokyo and investigating various places, she gave birth to me during her travels.” “‘The more accomplished a man is, the more lies he tells’—Mother often said that, though I suppose she spoke out of resentment toward Father.” His cheeks flushed faintly. “But whenever I asked about Father, Mother would immediately make a face like she was about to cry, so after I grew older, I stopped asking much.”

“But it became perfectly clear to me that Mother was desperately searching for Father’s whereabouts. I believe I was four or five when Mother and I boarded a train at a large station somewhere in Tokyo. After riding a long time, we transferred to a carriage and traveled endlessly through rice fields and mountain roads. I remember waking from sleep to find us still riding in that carriage. Then when evening fell completely dark, we reached an inn in some town. After that, Mother carried me on her back as she visited house after house daily, but wherever we turned there were only mountains. Day after day I’d cry to go home, and it seems I’d get scolded for it. Later, after returning to Tokyo by carriage and train, I remember being given a trumpet that made the same sound as the coachman’s from the mountains.”

——Then, much later, when I realized this must have been when Mother went searching for Father’s hometown and asked, “Where was that station where we boarded the train back then?”, Mother began to cry again and said, “Asking about that won’t accomplish anything.” “I went there three times by then, but I’ve given up completely now—so you should too.” “If I’m still alive and well by the time you graduate from university, I’ll tell you everything about your father,” she said, so I stopped asking after that. By now, even the shapes of the mountains and the appearance of the town I saw back then have grown hazy in my memory—all that remains in my ears is the sound of that rickety carriage’s horn. “However, after that, I bought various maps and tried investigating by measuring how long the train and carriage we rode back then had traveled. When I did so, I became convinced it must have been somewhere in the mountains of Chiba or Tochigi Prefecture.” “Yes.” “I don’t recall seeing the sea near the railway tracks.” “But since I might have been looking only at the opposite side of the train window, I can’t say for certain.”

“Where in Tokyo did you live?” “We seemed to have lived in various places.” “As far as I can recall, we moved through Komazawa, Kanasugi, Koume, and Sannougi in that order, finally coming here from Kougaichou in Azabu where we last resided.” “We always rented lodgings—second floors, storehouse interiors, what looked like detached guest rooms—where Mother would make various embroidered crafts. When several pieces were completed, she’d carry me on her back to take them to a house called Omiya in Nihonbashi Denmacho.” “The beautifully adorned enshrined deity there would always give me sweets.” “I still remember that house and the deity’s face.”

“What types of crafts was my mother making at that time?” “Well... I don’t remember clearly, but I think there were various things like sacred curtains, detachable collars, fukusa cloths, kimono hem patterns, and haori crest embroidery.” “How she sewed them... how much they sold for—since I was still so young at the time, I didn’t understand any of that... But there’s just one thing I still remember clearly: the pattern on a small fukusa cloth that Mother gave to the enshrined deity at Omiya when we came from Tokyo to Nogata.” “It was an exquisitely beautiful piece—embroidered all over sheer, translucent silk with chrysanthemum flowers of various colors and shapes. Each day she could only complete an area about the size of a fingertip. When I took the finished work from my hands to present it to the enshrined deity at Omiya, she was astonished and called out loudly to everyone in the household. They all watched in wide-eyed admiration.” “I later learned that this was authentic nuitsubushi—an ancient embroidery technique that no one today knows how to create.” “Then it seemed the enshrined deity’s husband tried to give my mother some money, but she bowed and returned it, accepting only the sweets before we left.” “Because Mother and the enshrined deity kept standing at the gate crying endlessly, I became utterly distressed.”

“The reason we came to Nogata from Tokyo was that my mother had performed divination,” he said. “Mother would say, ‘The teacher from Tanuki-ana’s predictions often come true,’ so I assume it was that teacher who told her: ‘If you two remain in Tokyo, you’ll be plagued by misfortune forever. You must surely be cursed by something—to rid yourselves of this calamity, return to your hometown. This year’s auspicious departure lies westward, as written on the front of the divination slip. You’re under Sanpaku Mokusei, Three Green Wood Star, sharing celestial alignment with Sugawara no Michizane and Ichikawa Sadanji—thus between thirty-four and forty you’ll face your most perilous years. The one you seek follows Shichiseki Kinsei, Seven Red Metal Star, which violently clashes with your Three Green Wood—persist in searching and catastrophe awaits. Even their belongings would war if placed near yours—the fiercest elemental opposition imaginable—so never keep their mementos close, not even forgotten ones. Pass forty and your fortune stabilizes; pass forty-five and exceptional luck unfolds.’ So we came here when I was eight, though Mother would later laugh to her students: ‘My stars must align with Tenjin-sama’s—that’s why I adore literature and arts!’ Through her constant repetitions, I memorized every word by rote... Yet she only ever told me about the Seven Red Metal Star, swearing me to secrecy...”

“My mother rented this house and opened a private school shortly after coming to Nogata. She divided the students—always around twenty in number—into two groups for day and night classes, teaching them in the eight-tatami mat room downstairs while joyfully remarking that such refined young ladies from good families attended. But my mother was short-tempered and often scolded the students. Ruffians and delinquent-looking youths would frequently come to harass her pupils or threaten her for money demands—even then she’d single-handedly berate them until they fled. ……Thus only three types of men ever entered this house: our elderly landlord; Mr.Kamochi my middle school homeroom teacher; and electricians. No letters ever arrived for my mother either—we never sent any ourselves. She didn’t even contact Madam Omiya despite their former closeness—it seemed she feared anyone discovering our whereabouts. She never explained why… though I suspect she took Tanuki-ana’s divinations too literally—believing someone hunted her. My mother wasn’t superstitious… yet she earnestly trusted only that Tanuki-ana teacher……”

“But truthfully، I detested Nogata.” “Perhaps due to my poor health during our journey from Tokyo، I became violently train-sick—developing such revulsion for coal smoke that arriving here felt like damnation، surrounded by mines spewing that stench daylong.” “Yet Mother praised this place so fervently، leaving me no choice but compliance.” “Though eventually acclimated—train nausea gone—the sulfurous air clung like ancestral sin.” “School proved worse، pupils’ tongues barbed with dialects from every mining pit across Japan.” “…children gathered from every province، their parents’ hands blackened by colliery work.”

“And also, perhaps because I’d moved around so much since childhood, I never had many friends. Even after coming here, I didn’t make many school friends either. But when I reached my fourth year of middle school, I resolved with all my might to enter Fukuoka’s Rokkomatsu High School. When I did, the air was so clean and the view so splendid that I felt utterly overjoyed… Yes… While taking the exams early was partly because I disliked Nogata, to tell the truth, I wanted to graduate from university as soon as possible.” I’d felt an unbearable urge to hear the story about my father—the one Mother and I had promised to discuss—as quickly as possible… Though I never spoke of this to her… It had been the same when I entered middle school. “There was no particular reason why… but that’s how I’d finally reached my second year in the humanities department (blushing, silent tears).”

“Strangely enough, even when I did well on exams, Mother never looked particularly happy. This had been true for years—while Mother never commented on my academic efforts or good grades, she seemed to genuinely loathe having my results publicly posted or seeing my name appear in newspapers and magazines. I disliked such exposure too, so whenever school regulations required submitting exemplary work, Mother would personally take me to the teacher and plead, ‘Please display it in some inconspicuous corner where people won’t notice.’ The teacher would remark, ‘She’s quite the modest lady,’ praising Mother in such terms, but far from being modest, Mother appeared to detest it with sincere intensity. When I was preparing for high school entrance exams too, Mother grew needlessly anxious about my name appearing in Fukuoka newspapers, so I suggested: ‘Then why not have me apply to some obscure private vocational school in Tohoku or another distant region? If we move there together, it might avoid Fukuoka press coverage.’ When I said this, she pondered awhile before replying, ‘You must attend university without fail, and it would be a shame to abandon all these students,’ ultimately deciding I should apply to Fukuoka. Yet even then, she repeatedly warned me: ‘Fukuoka teems with delinquent boys and girls—don’t leave the dormitory without good reason,’ or ‘If strangers approach you en route, don’t engage them carelessly.’ She drilled these cautions into me, but reflecting now, I realize the Tanuki-ana diviner’s predictions had indeed proven accurate—Mother must have believed someone was hunting her, hence her desperate efforts to conceal our whereabouts and perpetual anxiety over every detail.”

While at school, I stayed in the dormitory, but from Saturday evenings through Sundays, I would invariably return to Nogata. During vacations as well, I stayed home the entire time, waking up a bit early every morning to help my mother or do other things, but in return, I would go to bed around nine or ten o'clock at night. Mother was an exceptionally strong-willed woman; despite living in unpopular Nogata, she would sleep alone in this room whenever I was away. “Students start trickling in around eight-thirty in the morning, and I don’t get a moment’s rest until about eleven at night—so I never feel lonely at all,” she would say. “When you’re busy with studies or anything, you don’t need to force yourself to come home.” She would often say things like that.

Even up until very recently, there had been nothing out of the ordinary. It was last summer, I believe—Mother brought an American newspaper that had been used as wrapping paper for her embroidery materials and asked, “Who is this person?” When I read the article there, I realized it was a clown role played by a movie actor named Lon Chaney. Upon hearing this, Mother said dismissively, “Hmph. Is that so?” and went back downstairs. At that moment, I thought my father must be a person with such a face living abroad, which is why I remember every detail of that photograph clearly. At first glance, it looked like a large silkworm-like face, so I stealthily went downstairs to my mother’s vanity in the six-tatami mat room and peered at my own face, but there was no resemblance at all (blushing).

Nothing out of the ordinary had happened that evening either. I went to bed around nine o'clock as usual, but I didn't remember what time Mother went to bed. If following her usual routine, she probably went to bed around eleven o'clock. —And then—this is something I didn't mention to the police—that night, I woke up in the middle of the night. Since such a thing had rarely happened before, I thought it would be pointless to mention it if doing so would make me seem suspicious… Though I couldn't tell why, I thought I heard a loud thud—which startled me awake—but as it was pitch black and I couldn't see anything, I turned on this light I had placed near my pillow before bed and checked the wristwatch lying beneath the book I'd been reading—it was five past one. ……Then, as I was about to get up to relieve myself, I casually glanced at Mother's face turned toward me as she slept soundly—her mouth slightly open, cheeks bright red, forehead white and translucent like porcelain—and she looked astonishingly young. She looked exactly like one of the older students who came to our house. Then I went downstairs to relieve myself and turned on the lights in the six-tatami and eight-tatami rooms, but there was nothing out of the ordinary. I tried to figure out what that loud thud from earlier had been, but thinking it might have just been my imagination, I went back upstairs to look at Mother's face again—only to find her turned away, buried under the futon with just her hair in a topknot visible. I then turned off the light and went to bed, but I never saw Mother's face again.

“As I mentioned to you at the police station, Dr. Wakabayashi (Mr. W), I kept having these bizarre dreams. I rarely ever have dreams, but that night was truly strange. No. I don’t recall dreaming about killing anyone, but there was a train derailing from its tracks that came chasing after me groaning ‘Uun-uun,’ a gigantic black bull sticking out its long purple tongue to glare menacingly at me with goggle-eyes, a sun in the middle of a blue-blue sky spewing thick black smoke as it rolled about wildly, Mount Fuji’s peak splitting in two with bright red blood gushing out like a flood and crashing toward me in great waves—it was utterly terrifying beyond words, yet somehow my legs wouldn’t move and no matter how I tried to flee, I couldn’t escape. Amidst this, I thought I heard a chicken crow two or three times from the landlord’s coop, but even so, those terrifying dreams kept emerging one after another with such clarity that I simply couldn’t wake up. So as I desperately suffered and thrashed about, I finally managed to open my eyes with great effort.”

By then, the window grille had already brightened, so I felt a wave of relief—but when I tried to sit up, my head suddenly began throbbing with pain. Along with this, my mouth felt strangely foul and my chest grew queasy, so thinking I must have fallen ill, I went back to sleep. At the time I’d meant it to be just a brief rest, but this time I slept soundly without any dreams, soaked through with sweat.

Then after some time came someone—I couldn’t tell who—suddenly dragging me up by firmly pressing down on my right hand, trying to take me somewhere. Still half-asleep and thinking this must still be part of my dream, I tried to shake free and escape—only for another person to arrive, seize my left hand, and forcibly drag me toward the staircase. When I finally regained full awareness and looked back, I saw a man in a suit and a policeman trailing a saber crouched at my mother’s bedside, seemingly investigating something.

When I saw that, I became convinced Mother must have contracted cholera or something of the sort—and since I too had surely caught the same illness, this strange state of my body must be why—half-dreaming such thoughts through the haze, I was dragged away by two men, though the agony of that time remains unforgettable to this day. My entire body felt as though it were melting from exhaustion, as if all my bones were about to fall out. With every step down the stairs, my vision turned pitch black, and inside my head something swayed like water, throbbing with pain. When I tried to stop and endure it, someone suddenly yanked one of my hands from below, making me stumble down the stairs as if tumbling. Midway through, when I abruptly looked up, I saw my mother’s faded obi sash hanging in a loop from the handrail above me facing the staircase.

But at that moment, I lacked even the capacity to consider why it was there like that. Then, as I was being roughly shoved by the men accompanying me until my vision nearly darkened completely, I simply reached the back entrance, put on the red-thonged geta that Mother usually wore, and stepped out onto the side path. At that moment, the thought struck me—could Mother already be dead? Startled, I stopped and looked around. The men gripping my arms turned out to be a detective and officer from Nogata Police Station whose faces I knew well. Glaring at me with fierce expressions, they began yanking me forward relentlessly so that I couldn’t ask a single question.

The sun blazed so fiercely over the street that it hurt my eyes. A crowd had gathered before the house, and when I stepped out, they all turned to stare at me in unison. Those nearest scrambled backward, but seeing their sallow, glowing faces made my vision spin again until I nearly collapsed. At the same moment, a searing pain pierced through my skull—nauseating—and though I tried pressing my forehead, my restrained hands rendered me helpless. In that instant, I knew: Mother wasn't ill. Realizing they suspected me of having killed her, I let myself be led away without resistance.

At that moment, my mind must have truly snapped. I felt neither sadness nor fear. Yet my entire body dripped with sweat, and wearing nothing but a white yukata nightgown soaked through at the back and waist, I shivered uncontrollably. The sunlight beating down from above carried a strangely sulfurous stench that made me lightheaded, while a metallic taste flooded my mouth until I thought I might vomit. I walked spitting repeatedly, occasionally forcing my eyes open to stare at the glittering ground beneath my feet. When we turned toward the police station instead of the doctor's office, my heart began pounding violently—yet upon climbing the station's entrance steps, an eerie calm settled over me. Feeling as though I were reading a detective novel about myself or trapped in some half-remembered dream, I fixed my gaze on the grimy floorboards until a shout behind startled me. Turning, I saw the detective who'd brought me there bellowing at the crowd that had followed us, berating them for trying to enter the station. Some faces looked familiar, but I can't recall exactly who they were.

―After that, I was made to sit on a wooden bench (banco in the Kyushu dialect for stool) in a narrow room at the back, where police sergeants and detectives questioned me about various matters. However, because my head was splitting with pain, I had completely forgotten what replies I had given. I only remember insisting “It’s not! It’s not!” because they kept telling me “It’s a lie! It’s a lie!” over and over, but………….

――Then shortly after, Inspector Tani—known throughout Nogata town by his nickname “Inspector Crocodile”—entered and bluntly declared, “Your mother was murdered.” At that moment, my chest suddenly tightened with such intensity that no matter how I tried to endure it, I felt compelled to sob aloud. As I desperately held back tears while wiping my eyes, Inspector Tani—who had remained silent until now—threw something onto the grimy wooden desk before me and declared, “There’s no way you don’t know.” It was the obi cord from Mother’s everyday clothes—the one she always placed on her bedding when she slept—with its purple braided cord and iron eggplant-shaped fastener. Though quite old—Mother had been wearing it since leaving her hometown—I didn’t fully grasp its significance. Keeping my head bowed, I heard Inspector Tani thunder in a voice like crashing storm clouds, “You strangled your own mother with this, didn’t you?” The unreasoning cruelty of it made me flare up—I instinctively rose to glare at him—but then my head split with pain and nausea forced me back down. Gripping the desk until my knuckles whitened, I endured while my body trembled violently. Yet frustration burned through me—unbearable, unrelenting—and try as I might, I couldn’t stop the tears streaming down my face.

――After that, Inspector Tani kept pressuring me with all sorts of accusations. This inspector was apparently feared by every villain in the coal mines around here as an "oni" or "crocodile," but since that meant nothing to me, I just kept silent and listened... Then around eight-thirty this morning, two or three students came for their usual lessons but found both front and back doors unusually closed, so they notified the landlord out back. The elderly landlord then called out loudly through the gap in the back door, but she still wouldn't wake up. Before long, he caught a dim glimpse of two pale legs dangling at the top of the stairs leading to the back entrance, turning him deathly pale as he rushed to the police... When officers arrived to investigate, they first noticed the latch bar lying fallen by the back door. When they tried going upstairs, they discovered Mother in her nightclothes—having tied a narrow obi sash to the upper handrail and hung her neck from it with limbs dangling—while you lay there snoring away spread-eagle on the floor, half out of your bedding like you knew nothing about it. "But when examining your mother's corpse," he continued, "the neck marks didn't match the thin obi sash, and the bedding was disturbed—meaning someone must've strangled her first before staging the hanging. There's no sign of theft or forced entry either... That leaves nobody suspicious but you........."

“—And there’s more. Your mother must have struggled terribly as she was being strangled in bed—the strangulation marks are layered two or three times over. There’s no way you could’ve remained asleep lying right beside her.” “First of all—what’s your excuse for sleeping in over three hours longer than usual?” “You strangled her and tried to cover it up by pretending to sleep, but ended up oversleeping, didn’t you?” “You’ve got another woman who’s sweet on you, don’t you?” “Or maybe there’s a girl among the students you’re sweet on, and you had a fight with your mother over that, didn’t you?” “You extorted money from your mother, didn’t you?” “How much allowance do you receive every month?” “Is she really your biological mother or not?” “Weren’t you passing off your mistress as your parent?” “Confess fully… sprouting all these preposterous claims.” ……But as I listened to all this, my head went numb. So does it really happen that people kill others without even realizing it themselves? As I sat there with my head bowed, absently wondering things like… Could I have killed my mother in some half-dreaming state and forgotten it?… they threw me into a detention cell, saying, “Then stay here and think about it.”

Then, throughout that day and the following night, I drifted in and out of sleep without eating anything. When morning came, my head still throbbed, so I left the breakfast untouched. But as hunger gnawed at me unbearably, I ate the midday meal—it tasted extraordinarily delicious, and my headache vanished completely. Then, when evening came, I was startled by a woman who looked exactly like my mother coming to visit, but since she was this aunt, it turned out to be the first time I had met her since birth. At that time, this aunt also said the same thing as Dr. W. “Didn’t you have any disturbing dreams?” “Didn’t you have any disturbing dreams?” she asked… But at that time, since I simply couldn’t recall anything, I answered that I knew nothing. “……But since I had no idea at all that I’d been made to inhale an anesthetic……”

The following day, Dr. W came, and my homeroom teacher from middle school, Kamochi-sensei, visited me too. When another day passed, people from the court arrived and kindly asked about various matters, giving the impression I might be pardoned. I desperately wanted to see what had become of Mother, but upon returning the day before yesterday, I found her remains had already been cremated—I was devastated. There isn’t a single photograph in my house, so I can no longer see my mother’s face. Still, since this aunt says she’ll take me to her home in Meinohama tomorrow and I hear there’s a cousin named Moyoko, I suppose I won’t feel too lonely.

What I liked most was linguistics, but what I found most interesting within that was reading foreign novels—especially Poe, Stevenson, and Hawthorne. Everyone said they were old-fashioned... but I even thought about studying psychiatry when entering university. Truthfully, I had considered entering the humanities department to study various languages and going with Mother to search for Father’s whereabouts, but since she passed away having spoken only sparingly about him, I was disappointed. Beyond that, at that point, I hadn’t thought of becoming anything else. I didn’t dislike Japanese literature or classical Chinese, but after graduating middle school, I never felt compelled to study them further. Next came history and natural history as my favorites, while geography, physics, and mathematics bored me. Singing was my weakest skill, though I still loved listening to it. When I heard good Western music records, I felt as though viewing masterpiece paintings. When Mother was in high spirits, she would often sing folk songs with the students—I’d listen enraptured (blushing).

――I had never once fallen ill up until now. Mother also seemed to have never been bedridden. ―I would now go to Kamochi-sensei’s place to thank him for coming to visit me at the police station.

◆ Second Reference: Testimony of Kure Ichirou's Aunt Yashiroko

▼At the same location and time, after Kure Ichirou went out— “It all seems like a dream indeed. Ichirou is undoubtedly my younger sister’s child. His facial features are a living replica of his mother’s, and even his voice is exactly like our father’s—undoubtedly so.” “I do not know of the very distant past, but my family had been engaged in agriculture in Meinohama for generations. We sisters lost our mother early, and when Father too passed away in the New Year of my nineteenth year, the family lineage was reduced to just myself and this younger sister”—here she glanced at the memorial tablet—“Chiyoko. And so, at the end of that year, not long after I married my late husband Genkichi, my younger sister left home with a farewell note stating: ‘I shall go to Tokyo to study painting and embroidery, and live out my days unmarried—do not concern yourself with me.’ This occurred around the New Year of Meiji 40 (1907), but though there were those who later claimed to have seen my younger sister in Fukuoka, nothing definitive was ever ascertained. I believe it must have been entirely due to her love of painting and embroidery.” “As Ichirou has stated, she was an exceptionally strong-willed girl who indeed graduated top of her class from the prefectural girls’ school at seventeen, but once she started something, she had a disposition to become so engrossed that she would stay up all night reading novels or painting. She had been particularly fond of embroidery since her elementary school days—so much so that even when dusk fell, she would go out to the veranda, copy paintings from temple fusuma onto drawing paper, and stitch them with cotton thread scraps. Thus, I believe that upon seeing me wed my husband, she resolved to dedicate herself to those studies. Looking back now, that time was indeed our final parting in this life.” “However, as she disliked the rough work of rice paddies and fields, we often had her look after the house, but since my home was situated in a town-like area from the gate onward and saw considerable coming and going, we did not think she had done anything particularly strange when she left.”

“After that, the only news we received about my sister was indeed a notice from the village office in Komazawa Village near Tokyo at the end of Meiji 40 (1907), stating that a boy named Ichirou had been born. At that time as well, we immediately requested the police to conduct a search, but it turned out the house at the registered address had indeed been rented out long before. Moreover, as a precaution, the letter I had sent was returned to me, so I lost heart. We remained completely in the dark about how we had even obtained the family register documents for Ichirou’s elementary school enrollment, and then all communication ceased entirely. Then, in the New Year when I turned twenty-three, soon after parting from my husband, I gave birth to a daughter named Moyoko who is here now, and from then on lived with just my daughter and myself.”

“When I saw this incident in the newspaper, I rushed here in a daze.” “I underwent various investigations and gave my answers as stated.”

“When I first saw Ichirou, tears welled up involuntarily. The reason I inquired about dreams then was because there was a moving picture story those youngsters at my place were reading—it mentioned somnambulism. It’s some Western notion we simple folk can’t rightly grasp, but since deeds done while sleepwalking aren’t crimes, they’d jest about mimicking it to do mischief... Recalling their laughter, I thought perhaps... so I dared ask—forward of me as a woman, I knew—but I acted solely to help him.” Her cheeks colored faintly. “Through your gracious efforts, not only has Ichirou regained his unsullied state, but examining my sister’s remains proved she’d long stayed free of misconduct—this alone consoles me. Thus I’ll hold proper memorial rites here before bidding farewell to all who’ve shown kindness, as custom dictates.”

“Yesterday, a letter such as this”—she indicated a document—“arrived from the proprietor of Omiya in Tokyo alongside condolence offerings. He wrote: ‘When commissioned by an official of the Ministry of the Imperial Household to repair ceremonial robes and searching for my sister’s whereabouts, the police came—which was how I first learned of it and was shocked.’ Judging from the letter’s contents, it appears her ladyship—the one to whom my sister had confided various personal matters—has since passed away.” “Had my sister lived but a little longer, she might have found happiness... Though I know not what grudge moved them, should those who committed this atrocity be caught”—her voice trembled—“I would rend them limb from limb.” (Weeping)

“As for my family, at present there are only distant relatives remaining, so when speaking of those truly dear to me, it’s just my daughter and myself indeed. “I intend henceforth to raise Ichirou as my own child, devoting all my strength to nurture him into an admirable man... yet when I consider living bereft of husband and son, clinging only to this memorial tablet...” (weeping).

◆ Third Reference: Testimony of Ms. Matsumura Matsuko (Proprietor of Midoriiro Women's School, Mizu-chaya District, Fukuoka City)

▼The Fourth Day of the Same Month and Year: Reprint of Clippings from the *Gen'yō Shimpō* Morning Edition "That young lady skilled at embroidery attended this Midoriiro Women's School around the time of the Russo-Japanese War two decades ago. As I was in my thirties then, I'm afraid I don't know the details." "Yes, she certainly attended." "She must have been around seventeen or eighteen at the time, I suppose." "Though rather unremarkable at first glance, she was a petite beauty with sharp features—her name was Ms. Nijino Migiwa." "No, there's no mistake about it." "It's such an unusual name that I remember it clearly." "And apart from Ms. Nijino, I've never seen anyone else capable of that 'nuitsubushi' embroidery you mentioned."

“None of Ms. Nijino’s works remain in my possession. At that time, we still didn’t understand the value of such luxurious items, so they ended up being a waste of effort. There was one instance where a small fukusa cloth she had created over about two months—measuring roughly five sun square—was exhibited at my school’s exhibition, but priced at twenty yen, it ended up unsold. If it existed now, it would be something extraordinary. I also think I should have learned it. Ms. Nijino not only possessed such technical excellence, but also wrote characters far more beautifully than Mr. Ono Gadō’s exemplars, so I often had her write the characters used in my students’ embroidery. She was also quite skilled at drawing and would typically copy the better sketches from those I had. But just when I thought she had been attending for about half a year or so, she suddenly stopped coming.”

“Eh… When you ask whether there were visible signs of pregnancy at that time… Well no, given her petite frame it should have been immediately apparent… So you’re saying that dashing man abandoned Ms. Nijino and fled?” “Oh... Is that so?” “Oh…” “The house they were living in at that time?” “Well, if I did know that… but all the students from back then are nearly forty-year-old grannies now, you see.” “Heh heh heh.” “My, they say that man killed Ms. Nijino... Oh, how dreadful!” “Oh, what a waste to lose such a beauty... Now that you mention it, something does come to mind.” “I must ask you not to go telling anyone about this.” “Ms. Nijino was quite the man-eater—they say there were two or three university students who were made to suffer heartbreak because of her.” “Though this is merely hearsay, you understand.”

“At that time, no one knew where Ms. Nijino’s house was—she would come from the east or west and leave the same way, so none ever discovered her true home.” “My school never admitted anyone of poor conduct, but since there was never any concrete reason to reject her for such behaviour—and moreover, she herself maintained a diligent demeanour and was skilled at her work—well, there you have it.” “No, there are no photographs or anything of the sort.” “But for a grudge from back then, it does feel a tad too ancient now, doesn’t it?” “Hoho...”

“Huh?! So that’s the Mr. Kure from the famous Labyrinth Incident?” “Oh my... What am I to do?” “How was it discovered that Ms. Nijino was connected to Mr. Kure?” “Oh, she had been confiding her circumstances to the divine proprietor of a Tokyo bag shop.” “Only the man’s name remains unknown… Oh… I see.” “Please keep this matter strictly private.” And so on.

▲Supplementary Note: As the essential points of the incident records concerning Kure Ichirou’s first episode were fully encompassed within the fragments of the three preceding items, detailed accounts were omitted. However, while the Third Reference—"Ms. Matsumura's Fragment"—belonged entirely to the realm of superfluity as a reference for what I term "Kure Ichirou's first episode," I included it here both out of deference to Dr. W's insistence in compiling this record and as testament to how judicial authorities' investigative policies regarding said incident, along with contemporaneous newspaper articles, had been tacitly influenced by Dr. W's views.

◆ Summary of Dr. W's Opinions Regarding the Above

When I (Dr. W) first discovered reports of this incident in the newspapers and deemed it an exceptionally rare and ideal case of somnambulism, prompting my dispatch to investigate, this Nōgata region—originally situated at the heart of the Chikuhō Coal Field—stood as one of Japan’s foremost locales for violent crimes. Consequently, the investigative policies of the police authorities were simplistic and crude, resulting in the crime scene evidence being utterly trampled and obliterated by the day following the incident’s occurrence, rendering thorough investigation impossible. Nevertheless, through synthesizing the scene’s conditions, the aforementioned testimonies, the memories of police personnel involved, and neighborhood rumors, we were able to identify the following characteristics as distinctive features of this case.

(A) Within the women's school serving as the crime scene, aside from a bamboo rod—measuring approximately 1 sun (≈1.2 inches) in diameter and 4 shaku 1 sun (≈4.9 feet) in length, which had functioned as the sole fastening for the back entrance and had fallen to the earthen floor for unknown reasons—no fingerprints, footprints, or any other traces of the perpetrator were found, nor could it be determined whether such evidence had been wiped away. Furthermore, it was possible to infer that said rod had been positioned such that if the plank door were forcefully pushed from outside, one could insert fingers to remove it. Moreover, while the portion of the right plank door's edge that contacted the support rod had been newly covered with a zinc plate to prevent wear and ensure the rod's secure function, this very measure appeared instead to have created conditions allowing the rod's dislodgement through application of slight force.

(B) It was conclusively established that victim Chiyoko had been strangled from behind using a silk obijime cord between 2:00 and 3:00 AM that night—evidenced by her kicked-askew bedding and signs of extreme agony including thrashing across tatami mats—after which her body was transported to the staircase, hung from the handrail with a narrow sash, and positioned facing the stairway entrance to simulate death by hanging. Moreover, though it was discernible that the strangulation marks indicating hanging had formed double or triple layers—a condition observable even during the crime—the perpetrator’s additional staging of this as death by hanging might superficially appear crude concealment. Yet this was not so; when compared with their fingerprint-erasing actions, one recognizes this as an ingenious means of misleading investigators through illusory contradictions between these mutually opposing acts.

Furthermore, no objects were found in the victim’s hands or elsewhere. It was suspected that a mild anesthetic might have been administered. Moreover, as the sash cord identified as the murder weapon had subsequently passed through the hands of several police officers, no evidence related to the perpetrator could be detected. (C) That Kure Ichirou had been administered an anesthetic could be inferred from the post-incident symptoms manifested in his own statements. (D) Approximately forty hours postmortem, an autopsy conducted in the rear garden of the women's school under Medical Bachelor Funaki’s supervision and performed by myself (Dr. W) confirmed that the body showed no recent signs of sexual intercourse, with the uterus retaining only traces indicating it had once carried a child.

Based on the aforementioned facts, making inferences regarding both the perpetrator and the criminal intent proved nearly impossible. However, one could surmise that the perpetrator possessed considerable academic knowledge, was accustomed to using anesthetics, acted prudently, lacked physical robustness, and was someone who sought to avoid implicating Kure Ichirou in the crime. (Omitted). The investigative authorities initially pursued their inquiries based on these assumptions and released Kure Ichirou, but ultimately abandoned this approach in favor of purely speculative searches. Consequently—having yielded absolutely nothing—the case was ultimately abandoned in what might be termed a labyrinthine impasse. (Omitted)

▼ Psychiatric Observations Regarding the Above As this incident was not one that the author (Masaki) had investigated personally, he found himself somewhat constrained in providing specialized psychiatric analysis and explanation. However, when observing through the various characteristics of this incident—as recorded by Dr. W from his unique forensic perspective—it became indisputable that the truth of this case lay in a "psychological heredity episode" that utterly defied judgment and explanation within the developmental scope of modern so-called scientific knowledge and its accompanying common sense. This case stands as the most prominent and suitable example of what the author terms a "crime without a criminal." That is to say, each and every phenomenon pointed to the fact that Dr. W’s initial intuition had been correct—all of which could be extracted and clearly demonstrated. One could not help but express profound respect from the very outset for Dr. W's meticulous preparations—his refusal to abandon doubts regarding this point even after the incident, and his recording of such invaluable testimonies as those previously cited.

Namely, through Dr. W’s aforementioned observations and the three testimonies, if we enumerate the key investigative points required to uncover the truth of this incident, they are as follows.

I. Kure Ichirou’s Character and Sexual Life Kure Ichirou was a youth of sixteen years and four months at the time. Having been raised in a household dominated by maternal love and possessing regular contact with young women—characteristics typical of an intellectually inclined, sensitive, and physically well-developed boy of his age—he had already attained full sexual maturity prior to the incident. However, purified in character by both the immaculate beauty of that maternal love and the clarity of his own intellect, he exhibited no psychological defects that might have led to physical expression of such urges, maintaining instead an unsullied virginity as recognized by observers. That he confessed to having listened intently to a woman’s singing and appeared to blush may be recognized as characteristic of a youth of such temperament in this era; furthermore, from the endearing candor permeating his statements and the fact that—despite being acutely aware of the irrefutable reasons why he should be suspected as the perpetrator—he felt no trepidation regarding his own position, one could discern that he had lived a pure and unblemished virginal existence, his psyche untroubled by even the faintest shadow. Thus did this estimation regarding the aforementioned age and sexual life—influencing all psychiatric observations pertaining to this case and forming the essential foundation for critical determinations—stand as precisely why it had been specially emphasized at the outset to demand attention.

II. The Hypnotic Suggestion That Induced the Somnambulistic State Kure Ichirou’s confession—that on the night of the incident, having awakened around 1:00 AM and seen his mother’s sleeping face, he perceived an abnormal beauty in it—serves to corroborate the validity of the aforementioned observations while also elucidating the nature of the hypnotic suggestion that induced his psychogenetic episode, namely the onset of a somnambulistic state, which manifested that very night. That is to say, when considering the fact that his midnight awakening bore a profound connection to the peak of sexual impulses, it becomes evident through his aforementioned confession that Kure Ichirou’s mental state at that time had reached the very climax of a crisis. And this crisis should have been significantly alleviated during the time he went downstairs to relieve himself and returned to the second floor. Moreover, it is not difficult to surmise that upon seeing his mother Chiyoko—the object of his stimulus—turned away from him, he experienced no small measure of disillusionment, thereby returning to his ordinary composure and retiring to sleep. However, through the following detailed explanations aligned with each enumerated rationale, one shall come to understand sequentially that this temporarily suppressed sexual impulse—when Kure Ichirou fell into deep sleep—stimulated a certain terrifying psychological heredity latent within his unconscious realm, thereby inducing a somnambulistic state (see the section on the second episode below) and ultimately causing him to perpetrate such an atrocity.

III. The Relationship Between Kure Ichirou’s First Awakening and His Somnambulism The fact that Kure Ichirou experienced midnight awakening specifically on that night—which he stated constituted an abnormal event he had scarcely experienced before—might reasonably be recognized as a symptom indicating the existence of a somnambulistic state during subsequent sleep periods. However, prior to clarifying this reason, there existed one matter that necessarily required consideration: that investigators believed the sound of the support rod falling at the back entrance had caused Kure Ichirou’s first awakening. While Kure Ichirou himself appeared to hold this belief, I unhesitatingly deemed this a profoundly rash judgment—a misunderstanding arising from conflating sensory functions during sleep with perceptual functions during wakefulness. For when those who believed they awoke immediately upon hearing some sound during sleep later examined this through their post-awakening capacity for accurate judgment, they discovered in many instances that several minutes—or in extreme cases, one to two hours—of sleep had elapsed in the interim. The most extreme example of this was the well-known phenomenon where a late riser, while responding to multiple calls to awaken, fell back into deep sleep, eventually rousing only when the sun was high, then insisted they had awoken after a single call—a scenario familiar to all. The extent of profound error in perceived elapsed time between a sound sensed during sleep and the awakening stimulated thereby could be sufficiently demonstrated even through this single instance. How much more so in cases where one clearly perceived a sound while asleep, awakened because of it, yet subsequent calm investigation revealed nothing occurred—and such instances were exceedingly numerous. When viewed through this lens, recognizing an inevitable causal relationship between the sound of the support rod falling and Kure Ichirou’s awakening constituted an exceedingly perilous undertaking for precise deductive reasoning. Rather, one could assert that observing this incident by treating these two phenomena as entirely unrelated approached closer to naturalness. Moreover, hastily concluding—by directly linking this to Kure Ichirou’s abnormal state of mind post-awakening—that someone from outside had entered, administered an anesthetic, and perpetrated this atrocity constituted an extreme risk and might unhesitatingly be deemed unreasonable.

Now, regarding the true nature of the auditory hallucination during somnambulism that was mistakenly attributed to the falling of the aforementioned support rod—though I possess significant research materials worthy of separate publication on this matter—the present discussion must remain cursory due to requiring both extensive empirical examples and exceedingly detailed psychological explanations. Here I shall merely outline two or three particularly striking instances of "perceiving non-existent sounds during somnambulism" that prove sufficiently disruptive to sleep itself, provided here solely for reference. (a) When the progression of illusions being perceived during somnambulism suddenly encounters an impasse... for instance, the moment when a certain type of emotion (joy, anger, sorrow, etc.) rapidly intensifies to its climax while simultaneously hallucinating a scene of something exploding, scattering, or falling... etc...

(b) When a dream's progression suddenly plunged into a void of infinite depth... such as the instant one stepped off the world's edge or plummeted into an abyssal valley of darkness... etc... (c) When two psychological phenomena progressing within a dream abruptly intersected or collided... For instance, the moment when secret work performed in fear of discovery was exposed by that very feared individual; or when a steamship or automobile anticipating collision swerved violently and crashed before one's eyes... etc...

(d) Instances where phenomena progressing within a dream abruptly transform into psychological objects diametrically opposed to all expectations—such as discovering an intimate friend to be a murderer; companions suddenly metamorphosing into terrifying entities; or the moment when comfortable domestic furnishings and delightful garden blossoms shift into forms and objects constituting one’s most feared and abhorred visages... etc... When observing through the aforementioned cases, the true nature of non-actual sounds perceived within dreams is none other than... That is to say, we may understand that during the progression of a dream, the sudden and irresistible shock, terror, delight, or other abrupt psychological shifts experienced—due to their striking resemblance to the abrupt psychological shift caused by being unexpectedly struck by a loud noise while awake—are conversely misperceived and felt as a single auditory sensation.

Furthermore, when examining this incident through the lens of the aforementioned cases, one might consider that Kure Ichirou's so-called first awakening was actually an auditory illusion caused by a moment of terror-induced psychological state—a state emerging when the progression of a certain type of dream, shaped by sexual impulses that had peaked within his psyche immediately prior to this event, collided irresistibly with the appearance of a phantom symbolizing conscientious impulses stimulated through this very process. Accepting this hypothesis reveals that Kure Ichirou—having awakened amid the crisis of sexual impulse—perceiving abnormal beauty in his mother Chiyoko's sleeping face constitutes an entirely natural psychological progression. This may indeed be deemed a pure, unfeigned confession regarding those secret mental experiences particularly characteristic of youthful virgins during springtime. Simultaneously, the possibility that somnambulism—provoked and induced by this same impulse during his subsequent deep sleep—could exist became all the more profoundly corroborated.

Furthermore, the fact that the support rod fell must undoubtedly have been a means of concealing the crime carried out through the unconscious intellect activated during his somnambulistic state. Somnambulists who dare to commit violent acts and other wrongful deeds are not at all rare cases where they carry out such combined behaviors. Moreover, considering that the majority of such cases—as seen in this instance—always employ laughably shallow methods, one could recognize that such doubts were not unnatural. Alternatively, it might also be considered that these coincidental traces resulted from someone from outside who, while attempting to enter, accidentally dropped the support rod and fled upon Kure Ichirou’s descent while peering inside. However, as there appeared to be a lack of investigation regarding these points of doubt, we had to temporarily set them aside as unresolved questions.

IV. Initial Actions During the Somnambulistic Episode......Strangulation...... The fact that the purpose of the atrocity—which should serve as this incident's fundamental explanation—remains nebulous to this day, lying beyond rational deduction's scope, coincided with [the finding that] "within Tsukushi Women's School, no traces existed apart from those pertaining to Kure Ichirou, his mother, and its students." When synthesizing Dr. W's aforementioned investigative items—including those marked "et cetera"—one could most straightforwardly acknowledge that this incident's truth lay in Kure Ichirou's somnambulistic episode directed at his mother, while simultaneously explaining exhaustively how inferences about other perpetrators constituted illusions born from forcibly hypothesizing third parties. That is to say, it was inferred that Kure Ichirou—after falling into deep sleep with his psyche enveloped in the aforementioned sexual impulses—had risen into a somnambulistic state through a psychogenetic episode stimulated thereby; that following demands from a vision (its content remaining unknown at this juncture) arising within his consciousness, he picked up the victim's obi cord lying before his eyes and perpetrated violence against a woman who was this vision's object...in truth, his mother...; and that after continuing several bizarre somnambulisms worthy of academic marvel as would later be described, he returned to sleep. This atrocity was perpetrated during deep sleep-induced cessation of cerebral function—that is, conscious mental activity—wherein reflexive cellular interactions throughout the body served as cerebral substitutes (primarily through visceral organs linked to sympathetic and vagus nerves, with participation from muscular, connective, adipose, and circulatory tissues—all contributing to post-episode abnormal fatigue as detailed in my treatise Psychopathology). These interactions directly connected with sensory organs to observe, hear, judge, and execute actions. Consequently, no memory traces remained within ego-consciousness upon awakening. The confusion arising from conflating this phenomenon—namely, the dogmatic belief that all judgment-dependent actions must originate solely from ego-consciousness (the brain's waking-state cognitive function)—inevitably produced deductive errors like hypothesizing imaginary perpetrators. Given contemporary scientific knowledge's developmental stage, this outcome had indeed proven unavoidable.

Incidentally, among Kure Ichirou’s somnambulistic states studied through this incident, only this act of…strangulation…possessed a direct connection to the core content of psychological heredity—which this case aimed to demonstrate through the second episode (discussed later). All subsequent somnambulistic episodes could rather be deemed digressive in nature. However, the true nature of those subsequent digressive somnambulistic episodes constituted what might truly be called a rarity in academic circles—possessing considerable research value in mental science—and given that no other reference cases as intimately relevant as this could be found elsewhere, they were documented here despite some reluctance to digress, with the aim of thoroughly clarifying how the truth of this incident remained consistently rooted in Kure Ichirou’s somnambulistic episodes.

V. The Second Stage of Somnambulism Following Strangulation……Corpse Manipulation…… Despite the victim’s evident traces of agonized writhing across bedding and other surfaces alongside clear strangulation marks, the additional attempt to stage this as death by hanging—though superficially resembling a crude criminal concealment act—in truth does not constitute such……et cetera. While suspicions regarding the extraordinary intellect of a hypothetical third-party perpetrator might seem a partially justified deduction, I do not hesitate to deem this an overly scrutinized and unnatural observation. For these phenomena indeed narrate how the peculiar actions characteristic of somnambulistic states were performed at that very location on the night in question; not only does recognizing that what the author terms..."corpse manipulation"...was enacted by Kure Ichirou that night elicit no sense of unnaturalness whatsoever, but rather this serves as proof that the explanation for said phenomena remains both straightforwardly appropriate and beyond doubt.

However, regarding the phenomenon of corpse manipulation during somnambulism, there have been almost no clear historical records substantial enough to serve as reliable evidence since ancient times. Such phenomena are only sporadically found in records transmitted among the Laputan race—who held deep interest in these ultra-materialistic phenomena—and in legends surviving among superstition-prone Eastern peoples. And these so-called records are not of the kind that could be considered firsthand accounts. These records amount to little more than essays penned by monks and doctors of peculiar intellects—comprising hearsay or secondhand investigations—and not only that: eight or nine out of ten such accounts misinterpret or misrepresent events as using corpses to intimidate others, applying electricity to animate the dead, feigning death to commit crimes, or other superstitious acts like harvesting organs as potions, plundering grave goods, or necrophilia—all of which renders the truth frustratingly elusive.

However, there can be no doubt that such acts of corpse manipulation have existed since ancient times. That is to say, when examining the content of supernatural tales referred to as corpse gods, corpse demons, or fiery chariots in China, India, Japan, and other regions, one may infer from various disciplines—including natural sciences and mental sciences—that these accounts are in fact misrepresentations of this type of somnambulistic behavior... namely, corpse manipulation.

As for the detailed examination of these facts, I intend to compile them in a future treatise titled *Yokai Chapter* for thorough research and verification—a project currently in its organizational phase—but to summarize a portion here: these so-called supernatural phenomena, historically labeled as “corpse gods,” “corpse demons,” or “fiery chariots,” have long been misattributed to the work of fox-cat kin or monstrous avian creatures such as crows and owls. However, the facts are otherwise. According to these legendary records, when examining the circumstances of corpse manipulation, first and foremost there are descriptions of a corpse lying peacefully in a coffin or on a bed suddenly rising and running through the void. Thereafter, the deceased—eyes closed, hair and hands hanging limp—would stand inverted, somersault, remain tilted motionless, walk, roll like logs, inchworm-crawl, suspend mid-air, hang inverted, drill-spin, rotate like tops, arch backward, collapse like Buddha statues, flip backward, leap upward, or tumble down—all manner of grotesque forms and motions as though manipulated by unseen hands. Yet upon calm scrutiny, these contortions prove indistinguishable from an innocent child gleefully tormenting dolls or humanoid figures—forcing them into cruel postures while reveling in play. Moreover, during such play, the child in question nearly forgets the fact that they themselves are manipulating [the object], deluding themselves as though the doll intuitively sensed its own will—transforming and leaping about as it pleases—while deriving psychological satisfaction from this cruelty; a phenomenon we may readily observe in daily life. The psychology behind manipulating living creatures or pseudo-living entities—this behavioral pattern stems from our human ancestors’ primal exultation and triumphant fervor when conquering prey or vanquishing foes during their savage, uncivilized era. Such tendencies have been transmitted through distorted heredity, akin to how modern carnivorous birds and insects genetically retain their instinct to toy with prey (historical records solemnly attest to practices like jubilantly tossing enemy heads aloft). Moreover, one must note the fact that this behavioral pattern of manipulating pseudo-living organisms manifests more readily in male children—and when cross-referenced with the established facts (see the section on Variant Heredity in my treatise *Fundamental Theory of Psychological Heredity*)—it becomes irrefutable that such psychological heredity could indeed induce somnambulistic corpse manipulation of this nature.

To concretely explain by cross-referencing the aforementioned analysis with factual cases: first, consider those who attended a dying patient until their final moments or handled corpse preparations. When such individuals fell asleep—particularly sinking into deeper-than-normal slumber due to physical/mental exhaustion from caregiving or a peculiar sense of relief—the profound suggestion received from the corpse induced the aforementioned cruel somnambulistic psychology, leading them to exhume either unburied or interred corpses for manipulation. It could reasonably be regarded as natural that they themselves retained almost no memory of having performed these acts. Alternatively, even if one posited partial awareness in a semi-conscious state, they—like a child manipulating dolls—would fail to recognize their own agency in handling the corpse. Instead, they would misperceive the corpse itself as animate, believing themselves caught in a nightmare while manipulating and abandoning it somewhere or returning it to a coffin before retiring to bed. Upon discovering the corpse’s displacement or disappearance the next morning, they would panic and interpret it as supernatural mischief, thereby spawning such legends. That nearly all these oral traditions centered on minor misfortunes of impoverished households near corpses or featured a single corpse and attendant demonstrated how their supernatural protagonists were neither corpses nor beastly demons, but rather the somnambulistic acts of those sleeping nearby. The modern custom of multi-person vigils—proven today through countless historical experiences, whether consciously acknowledged or not—stood as definitive evidence that this practice most effectively prevented such paranormal incidents. Furthermore, the custom of placing blades at the deceased’s bedside must undoubtedly have arisen from their efficacy in disrupting such somnambulists’ hallucinations through visual stimuli—whether from the weapon’s gleaming edge or the dread-inspiring nature of its form. Be that as it may, when observed thusly, there could be no doubt regarding the existence of this somnambulistic state involving corpse manipulation. Moreover, it stood to reason that prior to the prevalence of all-night vigils and cremation customs, such somnambulistic states had been realized by a considerable number of those closely associated with corpses.

Next, when cross-referencing the aforementioned research and analysis with this incident, Kure Ichirou’s somnambulism following his act of strangling a woman that night closely resembled the aforementioned cases. However, the clear evidence of somnambulistic behavior imbued with perverse sexual content added here proved particularly noteworthy. That is to say, it was not difficult to surmise that Kure Ichirou—through a somnambulistic episode of uniquely inherited perverse sexual "psychological heredity" transmitted through his bloodline (see the second episode discussed later)—had first obtained primary satisfaction by strangling the phantom woman who appeared as his dream counterpart, then transitioned into general somnambulism...corpse manipulation...under the corpse's suggestive influence. However, the observed traces of intense writhing agony attributed to the corpse might have been confused with manipulation marks, making it difficult to determine whether those belonging to the victim's actual suffering constituted but an exceedingly minor portion thereof. Simultaneously, that this corpse manipulation contained a distinct profundity—one seeking a form of perverse sexual gratification—could be discerned from observing how the act, insatiable in its permutations, ultimately attained the utmost degree of aberration even among sexual perversions (see subsequent section).

【VI】The Third Stage of Somnambulism Following Corpse Manipulation…… Hallucinations of Self-Annihilation and Visions of One’s Own Corpse…… The perverse psychology termed “hallucinations of self-annihilation” and “visions of one’s own corpse” belongs to the rarest of anomalies even outside somnambulism; thus, delineating the psychological progression culminating in such aberrations proves no facile endeavor. However, to summarize for current reference: while sexual desire or romantic love fundamentally denotes psychological attachment to another individual of the opposite sex, tracing this to its ontological roots reveals that even ostensibly selfless expressions of affection ultimately manifest as instinctually principled or egocentric psychological phenomena—none other than manifestations cherishing and prioritizing one’s own living body and soul. Consequently, when such desire—shaped by constitution, temperament, and circumstance—becomes perpetually insatiable... or ignorant of satiation methods... or oblivious to satiation itself (though senescent decline of sexual drive—its diametric opposite—yields analogous outcomes, omitted here for brevity), these cravings intensify to extreme acuity and profound severity. The inevitable result sees conventional means failing to satisfy, ultimately derailing into perverse sexual territories while remaining unfulfilled—until at the ultimate extremity, this psychology reverts to its primal origin, plunging into narcissistic fixation and self-idolatry.

To begin with, let us illustrate this through positive examples. When insatiable caressive desire toward the opposite sex escalates to acrid intensity—wearied by the mundanity of conventional intercourse—it transforms into sadistic pleasure through abuse or murderous fixation (sadism), or necrophilic obsession (necrophilia). Progressing further through sequential stages of voyeuristic consumption of flesh (voyeurism) and fetishistic worship of bodily forms (fetishism), it gradually diverges from direct sensory stimulation by the opposite sex while paradoxically attaining profound aesthetic gratification through this withdrawal. Yet ceaselessly pursuing ever more heretical or grotesque profundities, the psyche becomes inexorably drawn into humanity’s primal narcissistic instinct—ultimately descending into solipsistic self-idolatry.

When observed from the negative aspect, the insatiable desire for caressive satisfaction—once supernaturally intensified—transformed into a craving for abuse (masochism), shifted abruptly to coprophilic fascination (coprolagnia), and progressed through willing acceptance of scornful gazes, derisive mockery, and abhorrent rejection from the opposite sex (exhibitionism et al.), ultimately descending into the same fate as its positive counterpart—a natural psychological progression. What is termed NARZISSMUS (self-attachment) is precisely this—it may be regarded as the manifestation of what the author calls the convergent point where both positive and negative perverse loves intersect.

Moreover, within this so-called "self-attachment," there also existed a perversion that unified both positive and negative extremes. That is to say, extreme self-caressing and adornment progressed into perverse proclivities such as self-abuse, partial self-exposure, or voyeurism; this shifted abruptly into psychological states of self-contempt, neglect, mockery, revulsion, or autophobia—ultimately advancing further still until one became a devotee of the euphoric sensations found in self-annihilation or the morbid fascination of visions depicting one’s own corpse. Indeed, instances of such psychological phenomena possessed an extraordinarily diverse and universal nature; one could not fail to recognize traces of this perverse psychology underlying even the dreamlike "self-admiration" found in the psychologies of historical seppuku, righteous deaths, or deaths from indignation—or the tearfully sweet "self-intoxication" discovered in ordinary suicides’ final testaments. Particularly regarding heartbreak suicides, it was no exaggeration to assert that not a single person existed who did not seek in these deviant desires their ultimate—nay, sole supreme—satisfaction. Beyond these lay even more singular manifestations of such psychological expression—from comparatively mild acts like erasing one’s own name and likeness…gratuitous mirror-smashing…volunteering to play wounded or corpse roles in mock battles or theatrical productions…to authors cruelly depicting self-projected figures in artworks—escalating to unwritten suicides…public self-annihilations before crowds…suicides staged with self and surroundings artificially beautified…sympathy double suicides…same-sex companion suicides…the very existence of suicide clubs…the metamorphoses of these desires and the grotesqueness of their manifestations defied all attempts at rational comprehension. Furthermore, even within the quotidian rhythms of human existence—the rising and retiring, the banter and laughter—this variety of perverse psychology seeped through the interstices of awareness and speech, maintaining an inseparable yet distinct relationship with humanity’s innate self-attachment. To enumerate each instance would have proven futile. Thus, here one must simply affirm that while such extreme perverse psychologies held extraordinary research significance, their manifestations were by no means rare or peculiar; rather, they exhibited a more universal propensity than intermediate forms of sexual deviance. Those possessing adequate capacity for self-reflection might perpetually discover these psychologies permeating every facet of their mental lives—a truth we must suffice to demonstrate.

Based on the foregoing analysis, when examining the distinctive features demonstrated by this incident, it was not difficult to surmise that Kure Ichirou had recognized—during both the initial strangulation phase of his somnambulism and its aftermath—the victim's striking facial resemblance to himself. Simultaneously, as the profound sexual impulse underlying this somnambulism remained undischarged through these actions, he must have repeatedly acknowledged this resemblance even while endlessly manipulating the corpse. Consequently, he became naturally susceptible to illusions and hallucinations of self-annihilation; we may reasonably conclude he strangled the corpse—now identified with himself—multiple times, a deduction far from unnatural. Thus one deduces he ultimately entered a somnambulistic state of corpse vision—lowering the victim's corpse (which he had equated with himself) from an upper-floor railing and gazing upon it with morbid fascination from the opposite staircase. Observed thusly, the incident's most critical features—multiple strangulations preceding the staged hanging—could be explained with perfect naturalness and clarity. The forensic investigation's failure to consider these points—having instead treated this as an ordinary crime—led investigators to largely overlook fingerprints and footprints related to these aspects. Consequently, certain details of these grotesque actions unique to somnambulism remained beyond conjecture—an outcome that must again be deemed an unavoidable oversight.

Incidentally, there was reason to surmise that the climactic state of sexual impulse which had sustained Kure Ichirou’s somnambulistic episodes up to this point was ultimately discharged through this vision of his own corpse. The subsequent actions of Kure Ichirou could be recognized as somnambulism—a lingering aftermath of this somnambulistic condition—having entered what the author terms a “staggering state.” However, given that one can infer how even within the somnambulistic actions performed during that staggering state there existed significant questionable features manifesting on the surface of this incident, it was particularly necessary to dedicate a new section to their documentation.

VII. The Characteristics of Somnambulism Exhibited by Kure Ichirou: Nightmares, Bad Breath, and Other Symptoms The suspicion that anesthetic agents had been used—arising from synthesizing facts such as Kure Ichirou's reported nightmares and his post-awakening symptoms of headache, dizziness, chills, halitosis, and nausea—appeared partially justified on one level. However, when observed from a psychopathological perspective, this too had to be assessed as an unavoidable error arising from the current developmental stage of modern scientific knowledge. In other words, ultimately, the aforementioned phenomena resulted from the exceedingly shallow and rudimentary level at which the true nature of dreams and somnambulism had been both scientifically elucidated and commonly understood. When judged through the two-tiered explanation provided below, one had to recognize that these phenomena did not arise from anesthetic use but rather most prominently exhibited characteristics that should be termed concurrent symptoms of somnambulism.

(A) Bad Breath, Other Symptoms, and the Rokurokubi Legend The headache, nausea, and fatigue Kure Ichirou reported experiencing post-awakening were—as previously noted—all concurrent symptoms likely arising from somnambulism. Yet among these, the observation I particularly wish to highlight here as intriguing material is... his statement about perceiving an unpleasant odor in his mouth. Regarding halitosis and other symptoms in such somnambulists—though these shall be discussed in detail in a future treatise titled *Yokai Chapter*—to disclose part of my hypothesis: there exist by no means few instances where certain somnambulists, until completing an episode, remain driven by various internal impulses fundamental to their somnambulism—not only perceiving no fatigue whatsoever but sustaining energy and endurance surpassing ordinary imagination. However, after passing through either the seizure's climax or its principal phase, they experience abnormal fatigue alongside mental relaxation, with intense thirst manifesting as a physiologically inevitable outcome. (This holds equally true when awakening from nightmares accompanied by mild somnambulistic behaviors like writhing or moaning.) Based on this principle, Japanese folktales concerning entities called *rokurokubi* (stretching-neck demons) or *nukekubi* (detached-head spirits) provide ideal comparative reference material for this incident.

That rokurokubi folktales and paintings symbolized the psychology of human dreams or somnambulism required no further elaboration here. Moreover, the fact that these rokurokubi—due to their habitual licking of oil, sewage, or other impure waters—came to experience foul breath by the following morning had been explained through such folktales and paintings; while this might at first glance appear an absurd fabrication, it was by no means unfounded. In other words, within this folktale, the inference that only the neck detached itself, writhed about, and licked something constituted an imaginative fabrication born from ignorance regarding dreams or somnambulism's true nature—whereas in reality, it simply resulted from individuals driven by physiological necessity during somnambulism searching for and consuming liquid while in intense thirst. Moreover, this desire—inevitably arising after passing through the seizure's climax—was sustained solely by thirst's stimulation, maintaining a state akin to barely continuing somnambulism; as such, consciousness clarity had markedly deteriorated, and investigative capacities became significantly impaired. Therefore, regardless of the liquid's nature, one would immediately swallow it upon recognizing it as water-like—a logical outcome. During somnambulism, should one ingest oil or sewage unknowingly—awakening with abnormal halitosis or nausea—it stood to reason that in antiquity's unenlightened eras, such individuals faced suspicion akin to detached-neck rokurokubi. This conjecture arose when families linked symptoms to diminished altar oil levels. Furthermore, this rokurokubi—the somnambulism protagonist—was represented by two archetypes: a habitually repressed young beauty and a three-eyed monster symbolizing humanity's ancestral *Stegocephalia*. The animalistic tongue-protrusion behavior constituted prime psychogenetic research material, though verbosity precluded further elaboration here. From this analysis, Kure Ichirou's post-awakening halitosis arose neither from anesthetics nor drug resecretion. That night's ingestion of non-aqueous liquid (perfume or solvent) provided evidence, with most pathological phenomena naturally attributed to its effects. However, that all related investigations had been neglected—though unavoidable—remained an eternal regret.

(B) The nightmares that Kure Ichirou believed he had seen continuously after awakening around 1:05 AM on the night of the incident and subsequently retiring to bed were in fact those he had seen during the brief period prior to his second awakening, which remained in his memory; like ordinary dreams, they bore no direct relation to the content of his somnambulism. On the contrary, that which was uttered during somnambulism—being attributable to the influence of some entity—is made clear by the preceding explanation. VIII. The Time During Which Somnambulism Occurred, and Other Matters

Based on the aforementioned rationale, when analyzing this incident, one may infer that Kure Ichirou's episode that night occurred between his first and second awakenings. Given that the victim's time of death fell between two and three o'clock, one may further deduce that Kure Ichirou entered the deepest sleep—from which such somnambulistic states arise—approximately thirty minutes to an hour after his second retirement to bed. Furthermore, the second awakening at dawn may be regarded as a manifestation of habitual subconsciousness during ordinary awakenings, and in the subsequent sleep, through the perspiration phenomenon, one may discern that Kure Ichirou finally freed himself from the nightmares induced either by the aftermath of somnambulism or by substances ingested during somnambulism, thereby entering true restorative slumber.

IX. Examination of Post-Awakening Awareness Regarding Somnambulism and Dual Personality Next, that Kure Ichirou—while in a dazed state during police interrogation under suspicion of matricide following his awakening—confessed to harboring an exceedingly slight doubt akin to “Then… could it be that I killed her and simply forgot?” may at first glance appear to constitute critical evidence that he retained some memory of his somnambulism. As briefly outlined in Item IV, while the facts of Kure Ichirou’s somnambulism that night should not exist within his conscious memory, one may reasonably doubt whether certain elements from the unconscious memories formed by cells other than the brain—such as the intense fatigue experienced at the time—had not surfaced into his awareness through the suggestive power of the inspector’s interrogation. Yet when viewed from another angle, one cannot definitively dismiss the possibility that this was not an illusion peculiar to such an intellect—an intellect of exceptional acuity, reflecting both purity of temperament and clarity of conscience—possessed by Kure Ichirou, a devotee of novels, who found himself in such circumstances. Consequently, these doubts do not definitively prove the existence of Kure Ichirou’s somnambulism. It can only be presented here as a single supplementary reference.

Furthermore, based on the foregoing discussion, one could comprehend with near-verisimilitude why somnambulists have long been regarded as possessing a form of dual personality. That is to say: within the unified personality of an individual—a coalescence of infinite memories inherited through generations of ancestors and countless traits encompassing diverse races, lineages, and individualities within that bloodline—a portion that separates and manifests during wakefulness constitutes what is termed dual personality, while that which emerges during sleep becomes somnambulism. Given that such somnambulists inherently possess hereditary predispositions, responsibility for crimes committed during somnambulistic episodes seldom falls upon the individuals themselves but rather frequently upon their ancestors and the societal conditions of eras that transmitted this heredity—a point imperative to append here as a reference for legal analysis of this case.

X. Riddles Concerning the Kure Family Bloodline Among the four items of discourse presented at the outset, beyond those extracted above, there appeared to be not a few passages suggesting that within Kure Ichirou’s psychology existed certain hereditary elements capable of inducing such somnambulistic episodes. That is as follows. [From Kure Ichirou’s Testimony] Despite it being explained that his mother Chiyoko possessed an unusually lucid intellect for a woman and a resolute character—and despite her defense of not being superstitious—the fact that she clung with extreme tenacity to utterly mundane and foolish superstitions concerning the destiny or fate binding mother and son led one to suspect that some form of inescapable anguish and unease perpetually existed within her psychological state.

The statement by the diviner known as Mr. Tanuki-ana—"You have been cursed by someone"—was suspected to stem from his having inferred a certain fact contained within her words during their conversation and thus uttering these words. [Within Yashiroko’s Testimony] When she first met Kure Ichirou at Nōgata Police Station’s detention cell and inquired, “Did you not have any dreams?”—this was because she had previously heard about somnambulism. Though she offered explanations to this effect, it remained inconceivable that Yashiroko—a woman who, as a farmhouse matron, should have possessed no education beyond rudimentary domestic training—could even have conceived of the possibility of such extraordinarily advanced psychopathological phenomena existing amid this extraordinary incident, let alone attempted to practically apply this understanding to immediately pierce the hidden truth of the case. This constituted a truly astonishing fact; even granting her remarkable acuity and decisive judgment, one could not escape a sense of unnaturalness. However, if this woman had constantly been compelled by some pressing circumstance to keep such matters in mind and had devoted keen attention to rumors or explanations concerning such facts, then her posing such a question under these circumstances could not have been deemed entirely unnatural.

The same woman had revealed that her family home in Hamanasu had few close relatives; yet such families isolated by bloodline were not uncommon among rural wealthy households. Moreover, as the cause of such isolation in many cases lay either in traditional ill repute associated with their lineage or in some abhorrent hereditary trait—resulting in those nearby being disinclined to form marital ties—it was suspected that the Kure family might indeed be one such lineage.

While Yashiroko repeatedly asserted that her younger sister Chiyoko’s reason for leaving home had been solely to pursue embroidery and painting studies, when scrutinized against the aforementioned doubts, it appeared to contain another layer of meaning. In other words, Chiyoko—foreseeing that remaining in the household with her sister would render marriage ultimately impossible—had absconded under a tacit pact with said sister to perpetuate the Kure bloodline in another province; this circumstance left room to suspect that her sister’s attitude toward searching for her whereabouts had not been entirely free from a certain lack of fervor. Moreover, given that both sisters possessed what was, for women, a remarkably strong-willed temperament, it had not been difficult to imagine that such a tacit pact could have been formed between them.

“the rumor that Chiyoko was a notorious man-eater”—when synthesizing these aforementioned facts and doubts, one might discern glimpses of subsequent actions undertaken by this woman who had absconded under such circumstances. Through these various points of doubt across each item, it became evident that within the Kure family of Hamanasu there existed something both traditional and truly horrific, and that Yashiroko and Chiyoko—sisters bearing their family’s final bloodline—appeared to have been fully aware of this matter; these facts had already been sufficiently implied since the incident’s very inception.

XI. What remained was the question of "through what variety of psychological heredity and to what degree of manifestation had Kure Ichirou's somnambulistic episode in this incident been carried out?" That is to say, regarding this first episode, the tangible suggestion that could be considered the direct inducement for his somnambulism amounted to nothing more than the simplistic notion of "the beauty of a woman's sleeping face," and since this stimulus had been provided by his mother—who possessed the weakest heterosexual allure—it was deduced that even the depth of suggestion pertaining to the Kure family's extraordinary psychological heredity had remained exceedingly shallow. Consequently, the content of that somnambulism coincided with the psychological heredity unique to this family (see later section) solely in the single matter of "strangulation." We may consider that he had transitioned into digressive somnambulism induced by suggestions from the corpse and its visage's appearance, thereby failing to manifest any further content of psychological heredity.

And it was through the various circumstances manifested in the second episode—which emerged approximately two years after the occurrence of this Nōgata Incident, as detailed below—that we were able to thoroughly clarify all fundamental doubts and provide explanations regarding the aforementioned items.

The Second Episode

◆ First Reference: Tokura Sengoro's Testimony

▼ Date/Time of Interview: April 26, 1926 (the day of the so-called Hamanasu Bride Murder Incident), around 1:00 PM——

▼ Location of Interview: 2427 Hamanasu Town, Sawara District, Fukuoka Prefecture—at the aforementioned individual’s residence—— ▼ Attendees: Tokura Sengoro (permanent farmhand for Kure Yashiroko; then 55 years old) — several members of his family (wife and children) — I (Mr. W) — End —

[Note: The text has been rendered in a form closer to standard Japanese due to the significant use of dialect.]

“Well now, there was nothin’ as dreadful as this. When I fell from the ladder’s top and hurt my back then—still pains me so I crawl even to piss—I near lost my life altogether. But since mornin’ I been drinkin’ burnt eggplant ash with sake and slapped on this wonder-cure crucian carp mash you see here—thanks to that, the ache’s eased considerable-like.”

“The honorable Kure household—what they call a thousand-koku rice family—is known as the number one great farming family in these parts. Beyond that—sericulture, poultry farming, everything under the sun—the present widow Madam Yashiroko handles all the accounts single-handed, so the family fortune keeps swelling... Tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands—who’s to say?—but it’s something mighty impressive. They built their own school, their ancestors built the temple—Young Master Ichirou as the heir should’ve been blessed beyond measure... Yet this unthinkable thing had to happen.”

“The Young Master was a gentle soul of few words,” “After coming here from Nōgata, he seemed always to be studying in the inner room, yet he never put on airs with the hired help or neighbors and was truly well-regarded.” “Moreover, until then—though we speak of the Kure household—it had been just Madam Yashiroko the widow and her seventeen-year-old daughter Miss Omoyo living there alone, making the house feel somehow gloomy. But ever since Young Master came to reside here in the spring two years prior, strange to say, the household had grown more cheerful in ways one couldn’t quite pinpoint, and we workers had come to feel our labor held purpose… Heh…” “Then, when spring came this year, Young Master graduated from Fukuoka High School at the top of his class and entered Fukuoka University again with the highest honors—and to celebrate this occasion, there was to be a wedding between Young Master and Miss Omoyo, so the Kure household was in such a buoyant atmosphere… Heh…”

“Well now, it was precisely yesterday—April 25th—when it happened. In that big Western-style Memorial Hall in Inaba-cho, Fukuoka, there was supposed to be an English speech contest for high school students. The Young Master was meant to give the opening address as valedictorian. He tried going wearing his high school uniform, but Madam Yashiroko stopped him and insisted he wear his new university student clothes instead.” “The Young Master gave a bitter smile but refused outright.” “When he tried slipping away protesting it was too soon, Madam Yashiroko forcibly dressed him in it herself. The way she stood wiping tears of joy while seeing him off still sticks clear in my mind.” “Looking back now, that must’ve been the last time he ever wore that university uniform.”

“Now, as I mentioned earlier, today—the day following that—was set as the auspicious date for Young Master and Miss Omoyo’s wedding, so we had been staying over since two days prior to assist with preparations.” “Miss Omoyo was working with her hair done up in an elaborate shimada style, wearing a grass-green furisode tied with a red tasuki sash. Her beauty was such that it was said to surpass even the portrait of her ancestor Lady Rokubi, and her disposition was truly gentle—so much so that the nursemaids would sing, ‘A thousand ryo for her skills, a thousand for her nature, the rest depends on her husband.’” “Now, regarding Young Master—he was twenty years of age, but in terms of judgment and bearing, he carried himself with such reliability that even those nearing thirty could not match him. His manly demeanor was truly something to behold, and his conduct was so exemplary one might think even court nobles would find none better—thus it became the talk of Hakata that such a couple could not be found elsewhere.” “Moreover, the preparations spared no expense—to formalize Young Master’s status as a groom entering the household, they demolished borderland paddies to erect a splendid detached house, while all the garments were tailored by Kyōya Kimono Store, the finest in Fukuoka.” “As for the cuisine as well, since yesterday, the renowned caterer Uokichi—said to be the best in Fukuoka—had been brought in and was making quite a stir, such that Madam Yashiroko’s determination was truly something to behold.”

――But regarding Young Master’s role at yesterday’s speech meeting—it was just a small part, and he had clearly stated before leaving that no matter how late it ran, he would return without fail by two o’clock. Yet even as we busied ourselves with various tasks and three o’clock passed, there was still no sign of his return. “The Young Master was not one to ever make mistakes about such matters, so when I raised this concern with the elders, the others just said things like ‘The speech must’ve started late,’ and paid it no mind.” However, as nothing like this had ever happened before, and given the circumstances, I was not free from worry either; but while becoming absorbed in the busyness, the capricious weather soon brought a blanket of clouds across the sky, and the long spring day abruptly darkened as though evening had fallen. Then，seemingly having noticed this，Madam Yashiroko—who from tomorrow would take on a maternal role—called me into the shadows while hastily wiping her hands and made this request: “He’s already twenty，so there shouldn’t be any mistake，but since he still hasn’t returned，could you go check around there?” I was just thinking the same thing myself, so after finishing up the repairs on the steamer basket I’d been working on, smoking a pipeful of tobacco, I set out still wearing my straw sandals—must’ve been around four o’clock or so. “I took the light railway to Nishishinmachi and stopped by my brother’s stew shop near the tram terminus at Imagawabashi. When I asked, ‘Haven’t you seen our young master?’ he replied, ‘Oh… If it’s that young master, he passed through here about two hours ago—walked westward without taking the tram.’” “Since it was the first time we’d seen him wearing his university uniform, the two of us went outside and watched him depart for some time.” “He’s a fine groom, ain’t he~” the couple said.

“The Young Master was said to have detested the smell of railway smoke since long ago—so much that even when attending high school, he walked every single day from Hamanasu through the rice paddies for the exercise.” “But even so, since it’s barely four kilometers from Imagawabashi to Hamanasu… It shouldn’t take two hours…” Worry gnawing at me, I began making my way back around half past four.” “As I returned along the tracks by the national highway, there happened to be a quarry at the foot of a mountain along the coastal side of the road, quite near Hamanasu.” “The stone quarried there’s called Hamanasu stone—a soft black rock you’d recognize if you saw it on your return—but mark my words, it’s a place you must pass through whether coming from Fukuoka or heading toward it.” ……Amidst those quarry rocks jutting up like a folding screen, in the dim recesses at the far end bathed in the crimson light of the setting sun, I thought I glimpsed a figure in Western clothes moving—wearing a square hat.

“My eyes aren’t what they used to be, but thinking this must be it, I approached and indeed found the Young Master seated in the shadow of a tall rock, gazing at what appeared to be a scroll. I climbed over the stacked cut stones there until emerging just above the Young Master’s head, then slowly stretched my neck to peer down. What lay before him appeared to be part of an exceedingly long scroll, yet strangely seemed nothing more than blank white paper without a single character written upon it. However, something appeared visible to the Young Master’s eyes, for he was intently gazing at that white expanse.”

“I’d long heard rumors about a cursed scroll in the honorable Kure household.” “But that was ancient history—in this modern age, such things couldn’t possibly exist.” “Even if it did exist, I’d always thought it mere talk—never dreamed that very scroll might be real.” Thinking my failing eyes were to blame, I cautiously leaned closer without alerting the Young Master—but the paper remained blank white, no matter how fiercely I rubbed my eyes.

“Well now, I couldn’t help but be puzzled,” When I thought to ask what the Young Master was looking at, I hurriedly descended from the rocky ledge. After deliberately taking a detour to emerge before him, I suddenly came face to face with the Young Master—he showed no awareness of my approach whatsoever, holding the half-unfurled scroll in both hands while gazing vacantly at the crimson western sky as if deep in thought. Thereupon, I cleared my throat once and called out, “Young Master,” whereupon he appeared startled and stared fixedly at my face before saying, “Oh… Sengoro?” When he smiled as if noticing me for the first time and asked, “Why did you come here?” he neatly rolled up the scroll he’d been holding facedown, winding the string tightly around it. At that moment, assuming the Young Master had been pondering something of great importance, I innocently relayed Madam Yashiroko’s concerns and inquired, pointing at his hand, “What sort of scroll might that be?” Then—having turned back toward Mount Seburi at some point while lost in thought—the Young Master suddenly looked startled and began comparing my face with the scroll before declaring, “This? It’s a scroll I must complete now—a precious item to be presented to His Majesty the Emperor once finished.” “I can’t show this to anyone,” he repeated as he respectfully slipped it into his Western coat pocket beneath his overcoat.

――Growing increasingly perplexed, I said, “But… what is written inside it…?” At this, the Young Master turned slightly red and replied with a bitter smile, “You’ll understand soon.” “There are very interesting stories and terrifying pictures drawn.” “He said that person told us we must absolutely see it before holding our ceremony… You’ll understand soon… You’ll understand soon…” I found myself in a peculiar state—as if I both understood and didn’t understand—but then I noticed how the Young Master’s manner of speaking was oddly distracted, so unlike his usual self. Though aware I might seem pushy, I pressed once more for confirmation: “Hmm… And who gave you such a thing?” At this, the Young Master—who had been staring at me with such intensity it felt like holes would bore through my face—suddenly widened his eyes as if regaining his senses and blinked two or three times. Then, perhaps thinking of something, he teared up slightly and stammered, “The person who gave this to me…? That was an acquaintance of my deceased Mother who came to return a scroll secretly entrusted to her by Mother.” “That person will surely meet me again before long.” “He said he’d tell me his name then… and with that, he vanished somewhere. But I know exactly who that person is.” “But... he hasn’t said anything… hasn’t said anything yet.” “You must not speak of this matter to anyone else.” “‘Now listen… Come on, let’s go.’ As he said this, the Young Master suddenly grew restless, hopping from stone to stone until he reached the thoroughfare. He then strode briskly ahead of me—his pace was so rapid… It was as if he were possessed, utterly unlike his usual self.” Looking back now, there were already somewhat strange signs from that very moment…

When the Young Master arrived home, Madam Yashiroko immediately said to him, “You’ve…been delayed,” but when she asked, “Did you meet Sengoro?” he replied, “Yes.” “We met at the stone quarry.” “He’s just returned there now,” he said, gesturing toward me as I entered from behind, then briskly headed off toward the detached house. Madam Yashiroko appeared relieved by this and asked me nothing further, merely saying “Thank you for your trouble.” She then signaled with her eyes to Miss Omoyo—who had been wiping stacked rice bowls along the wooden boarding beside her—whereupon Miss Omoyo, though visibly embarrassed under the gaze of the many people present, stood up and followed after the Young Master carrying an iron kettle toward the detached house.

Then there was one more thing—though I believe the reason became clear only later—a somewhat strange incident occurred before nightfall. ……After that, I spread a mat beneath the gardenias by the back entrance and set to mending the remaining repairs on the steamer basket while clenching my pipe between my teeth. From there, through the gardenia branches, I had a direct view into the sitting room of the detached house. Watching without truly watching, I saw the Young Master change his clothes before the desk in that room, then drink tea Miss Omoyo had prepared while seemingly instructing her about something……Though the glass storm shutters muffled their voices, his complexion was uncharacteristically pale, and the way his eyebrows twitched made it appear as though he were scolding her—yet upon closer observation, that did not seem to be the case. Miss Omoyo, for her part, was folding Western clothes before him, her face red as she laughed and shook her head saying “No, no,” creating a truly peculiar scene.

However, upon seeing this, the Young Master's face grew even paler as he sidled up to Miss Omoyo with a tight grin. Then, from where I could see, he pointed toward those three aligned storehouses while placing one hand on Miss Omoyo’s shoulder and shaking her two or three times. Miss Omoyo—who had been crimson-faced and shrinking into herself since earlier—finally raised her head to look at the storehouses alongside the Young Master. Soon, with an expression neither clearly joyful nor sorrowful, she gave a slight vertical shake of her fresh shimada hairstyle before flushing red down to her nape and slumping forward entirely… It felt like watching some New School theater performance, I tell you…

――Then the Young Master, having gazed intently at her demeanor, remained crouched halfway with his hand still on Miss Omoyo’s shoulder and appeared to be scanning the area through the glass storm shutters—but soon, tilting his head back to look up at the evening sky beneath the eaves, he bared his white teeth as if recalling something and smiled thinly. Then he seemed to stick out a red tongue and lick his lips repeatedly—but that smile of his, so ghastly pale and unnerving, made me shudder involuntarily… I tell you… Yet never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that very moment heralded such events to come. “I tell you… I just thought maybe educated folks make such strange gestures… and then got caught up in the busyness and forgot all about it…”

“And then last night—it must have been around two in the morning—every soul in the household had finally fallen asleep. The bride Miss Omoyo and her mother-in-law Madam Yashiroko were in the inner room of the main house… while the groom—the Young Master—and I, acting as his guardian, bedded down in the detached house. To be precise, I retired much later than the Young Master, bathing past midnight. After securing the detached house, I laid my bedding in what served as the tea room adjacent to his chamber. But as old folks do, I awoke this morning while dawn was still dim. When I set out for the privy—guided by the faint light through glass storm shutters—I reached the veranda before the Young Master’s room to find one new shoji screen slid open, its corresponding shutter left ajar. Peering inside, I saw no sign of the Young Master in his bed. ‘…How peculiar…’ I thought, a sudden unease gripping me. Since a light rain fell outside, I retrieved my clogs from the new kitchen entrance and picked my way along stepping stones toward the main house. There in the gloom, one of the inner room’s shutter compartments stood open, faint traces of sand-caked clogs visible nearby. I hesitated briefly before resolutely removing my clogs and stealing down the corridor on tiptoe. Peering through glass shoji into the inner room, I saw Madam Yashiroko asleep under dim electric light, one arm flung out. Beside her lay Miss Omoyo’s bedding—an empty husk with futon folded toward the foot and only a crimson-covered high pillow placed squarely at center.”

――At that moment, I finally recalled what I had seen the previous evening... Oh, so that was it. In that case, there was no particular need to worry… I somehow managed to calm myself down. But... upon reconsidering—though this path alone was different—I realized that what the Young Master was doing seemed somewhat suspicious for him, and that vague unease began to stir within me once more. Could it be that premonitions truly exist...? At any rate, I mustn't let this become my oversight.

“I thought to act before everyone awoke... I roused Madam Yashiroko. When I pointed at Miss Omoyo’s empty bedding and began explaining the situation, Madam Yashiroko—who had been rubbing sleep from her eyes—suddenly stiffened with realization. ‘...Have you seen Ichirou carrying something like a scroll lately?’ she abruptly inquired in an odd tone, sitting bolt upright on her futon. “‘Hmm… Well… Yesterday when I met him at the quarry, he seemed to be reading a long scroll—nothing but blank white paper, if I may say…’ I replied, though at the time I remained oblivious. Yet I shall never forget the drastic change in Madam Yashiroko’s countenance then—‘It’s reappeared?!’ she rasped in a choked voice, gritting her teeth until her lips whitened, fists clenched and trembling violently, eyes rolled back in a frenzied trance. “Still paralyzed with terror and utterly bewildered, I remained sprawled on the floor watching when Madam Yashiroko finally regained her composure. Tears streamed down her face as she wiped them away with her sleeve, forcing a smile that mingled tears and laughter. ‘No, no… It might be my misunderstanding. Or perhaps your misperception.’ “‘Anyway, go look for where he is,’ she said, standing up. “At that moment, she appeared completely composed as usual, leading the way down from the veranda—but in truth seemed greatly flustered. I followed behind her barefooted path toward the front entrance, having slipped into my geta.”

――The light rain had already stopped by then, I believe, but when we soon arrived before the detached house at... that third storehouse on the far right visible from here, I noticed the copper-clad door facing north on the storehouse had been left open, so I stopped Madam Yashiroko—who was walking ahead—and pointed it out. In retrospect, this third storehouse had been empty until around the wheat harvest season, with various farm tools thrown inside, so there was frequent coming and going—thus the young ones would often carelessly leave its windows open. At this moment too, it might have been no different—there should have been nothing particularly strange about it—but perhaps because I recalled what had happened during the day, I involuntarily gasped and stopped in my tracks…… Whereupon Madam Yashiroko nodded and went around to the storehouse door, but it appeared to be secured from the inside, for the earthen door did not budge an inch. Thereupon, Madam Yashiroko nodded again and personally fetched the six-foot ladder hooked on the main house’s waistboard nearby. She quietly propped it beneath the storehouse window, then gestured for me to climb up—but her expression was far from ordinary. Moreover, when I looked up at that window, there appeared to be some sort of flickering light shining through.

――As you well know, I am a terrible coward, so I felt quite uneasy—but Madam Yashiroko’s expression was anything but gentle, leaving me no choice but to remove my clogs, hike up my kimono hem, and climb to the top of the ladder. Gripping the window ledge with both hands, I peered quietly inside… but as I looked, my legs lost all strength, leaving me unable to descend. At the same time, the strength in my hands gripping the window ledge seemed to vanish entirely—I tumbled head over heels to the ground, striking my lower back so fiercely that I could neither stand nor flee.

―I tell you… The scene I witnessed through that window in that moment is something I will never forget—no matter how hard I try. To describe it: in a corner of the storehouse’s second floor, empty straw sacks had been piled up, with a square bed-like structure constructed at the center of the plank flooring. Upon this lay Miss Omoyo’s gaudy nightclothes and red underrobe spread out in a set and draped over. On top of that lay Miss Omoyo’s corpse—her hair still arranged in a high shimada chignon glistening like water—completely naked and laid supine, while before her stood the old sutra desk that had been placed in the main house’s sitting room. To the left stood a brass candlestick from the household Buddhist altar, its hundred-monme candle burning steadily, while to the right appeared to be arranged school supplies like paints and what looked like brushes—though the finer details escape my memory. And there, spread out neatly before the Young Master in the center, was the scroll we had seen at the stone quarry yesterday… I tell you… there is no mistake about it. "It was indeed the scroll I saw yesterday; I recognized the brocade patterns at the edges and the color of the spindle." “It appeared to be nothing but blank white paper with no writing… I tell you… The Young Master sat perfectly straight facing the scroll, properly dressed in his white hemp sleeping robe. But when I peered inside, he calmly turned toward me—why he affected such airs, I don’t know—smiling faintly as he waved his hands side to side in a ‘You mustn’t look’ manner.” Though I recount it this way, these are all things I recalled afterward; at the time, I had stiffened as if electrocuted and was in such a daze that I cannot say what sounds I made.

――Madam Yashiroko seemed to ask something while helping me up at that moment, but I cannot clearly recall whether I responded or not. I think I might have pointed at the storehouse window and said something… Whereupon Madam Yashiroko seemed to comprehend, repositioned the nearly collapsed ladder, and climbed up herself. I tried to stop her, but with my back unable to rise and my teeth chattering uncontrollably, I could not even utter a sound. Lying sprawled on the cold earth with my hands behind me, I looked up to see Madam Yashiroko briskly climb the ladder with her kimono hem tucked up, gripped the window ledge, and peered inside just as I had done—quietly, stealthily. But... the sheer composure Madam Yashiroko showed in that moment still makes my hairs stand on end whenever I recall it.

Madam Yashiroko peered intently through the window at the scene inside, then asked in a composed voice, “What are you doing there?” From within came the Young Master’s reply in his usual calm tone: “Mother… please wait a moment. “It will begin to rot soon…” The surroundings lay deathly silent… After a moment’s contemplation, Madam Yashiroko responded, “It hasn’t quite started rotting yet. Rather than that—since dawn’s already broken—come down to eat your meal.” A clear “Yes” echoed from inside. The Young Master appeared to rise, causing the firelight reflected in the window to abruptly dim……but……could these truly be words spoken by a mother facing her daughter’s corpse?……Madam Yashiroko then hurriedly descended the ladder and ran toward the storehouse door while shouting “Doctor! Doctor!” at me……though to my shame, I understood nothing of what transpired—and even had I understood, my legs had given out completely, leaving me immobilized. I simply trembled uncontrollably, overwhelmed by terror, unable to stand or remain seated.

When the storehouse door opened, the Young Master emerged holding a key in one hand and wearing garden clogs. He smiled faintly at us, but his eyes now differed completely from their usual state. Madam Yashiroko—who had been waiting impatiently—quietly took the key from his hand and, with a coaxing manner, pressed her mouth to his ear to whisper several words before briskly pulling him by the hand into the detached house to put him to bed—all of which I could clearly see from my position.

――After that, Madam Yashiroko turned back and went up to the storehouse’s second floor, where she seemed to be doing something furtively. Meanwhile, left utterly alone, I became so terrified I could hardly breathe. Crawling on all fours, I made my way to the back gate behind the storehouse and clung to the citrus tree standing there. Finally managing to straighten my limp legs, I hauled myself upright. Then, from beneath the leaves overhead came the sharp *snap* of the copper-clad storehouse window shutting—startling me into whirling around—followed by the decisive *clank* of a lock being fastened at the storehouse entrance. Moments later, to my left, Madam Yashiroko—barefoot, hair disheveled, scroll clutched tightly in hand—dashed toward the detached house. Then, with muddy feet, she raced up from the veranda, roused the Young Master who had just gone to bed, thrust the scroll at him with a terrifying expression, and began harshly interrogating him in a few words—all clearly visible through the now-brightened glass door.

――At that moment, the Young Master pointed toward yesterday’s stone quarry, shaking his head while mixing in peculiar hand gestures and bodily movements as he appeared to speak with desperate intensity. We hadn’t properly heard his explanations from the start, and with all those arcane terms he used, we couldn’t make sense of it—though phrases like “for His Majesty” and “for the people” seemed to repeat endlessly. Madam Yashiroko appeared to listen with saucer-wide eyes while nodding along, but soon the Young Master abruptly fell silent. He stared fixedly at the scroll she thrust toward him—then suddenly snatched it away and crammed it deep into his robe’s inner pocket. Thereupon Madam Yashiroko forcibly wrested it back—though in hindsight this proved ill-advised…… Deprived of the scroll, the Young Master seemed to deflate, his jaw hanging slack as he stared bug-eyed at Madam Yashiroko’s face—an expression so unnerving that even she recoiled in terror, slowly rising to retreat. Thereupon the Young Master seized her sleeve with viperish speed, forcing Madam Yashiroko back down onto the tatami. After staring goggle-eyed at her face once more, he narrowed his eyes in apparent delight and grinned slyly at her.

When I saw that face, I couldn’t help but shudder as if doused with cold water. Madam Yashiroko appeared to be trembling violently as she tried desperately to break free when the Young Master sprang upright. He seized the nape hair of Madam Yashiroko—who had been halfway down the veranda—from behind, pulled her backward to the ground, then dragged her roughly from the veranda into the garden. All the while grinning placidly, he seized a nearby geta and began striking Madam Yashiroko’s head repeatedly with apparent relish. Madam Yashiroko turned ashen as earth before my eyes—her hair disheveled, face streaming blood—as she crawled across the soil letting out a deathly scream… Witnessing this, I lost all will to live. Clutching my waist while stamping my trembling knees, I staggered back to this house. “Doctor! Doctor!” I cried to my wife, then trembled beneath the futon pulled over my head. Then, when Dr. Munechika came to my house in confusion, I sent him away, saying, “It’s the Kure residence! The Kure residence!”

"What I saw is only this... I tell you... everything is genuine and without exaggeration. I later heard that two or three young men, roused by Madam Yashiroko’s screams, came and restrained the Young Master, binding him with thin ropes—but they say his thrashing strength at that time was beyond that of three or even five men, snapping the ropes twice over. After finally restraining him immobile by tying him to the base of the main pillar in the detached house, the Young Master seemed exhausted and fell into deep, snoring sleep—or so they say. Yet when he awoke amidst this state, his demeanor had astonishingly transformed entirely. Even when questioned by police officers, he merely glanced about vacantly without offering any response whatsoever... Madam Yashiroko stated that during the previous incident in Nogata, this same affliction had manifested—apparently university investigators had discovered paralytic drugs were involved then—and since there had been no recurrence until now, they brought him here. But seeing this current spectacle makes clear how dreadful bloodlines can be—undoubtedly this is the cursed scroll’s retribution at work."

“Though mind you, this scroll’s curse hasn’t shown itself in ages, so we hardly know what it truly entails… But from what I gather, that scroll was enshrined within the belly of the main Buddha statue at Kisaragi Temple—you can just make out its roof over yonder. They say any man born of Kure blood who lays eyes on it will surely lose his wits and commit atrocities—be it against parent, sister, or any woman at all, even a stranger. Some claim records of its origins lie in that temple… others say not… But how that scroll came into the Young Master’s hands—that’s a mystery beyond telling.” “I tell you… The current abbot of Kisaragi Temple—Reverend Horin they call him—is said to be as esteemed as those of Shōfukuji Temple in Hakata. With such karmic matters at play, he’d surely know all… I tell you… He’s ancient now—body withered like a crane’s, eyebrows and beard hanging white as snow down his face. A right awe-inspiring holy man, he is.” “If it please you, why not meet him and hear his account?” “I’ll have my old woman show you the way…”

“I tell you… Madam Yashiroko’s gone half-mad now—sprained her leg and taken to bed, so they say. They claim her head injury ain’t serious, but her talk flits between sense and nonsense—defies all reason. My own legs gave out… can’t even go visit her…” “Some said everything turned too late ’cause I didn’t run to Dr. Munechika, but that’s unreasonable. When he came to check my back, the doc said Miss Omoyo was strangled ’tween three and four this mornin’. Said the candle’s burn rate matched that too. I tell you… rest’s just as I told ya. If Madam Yashiroko were sound, all’d be clear—but like I said, one breath she’s cursin’ the Young Master… if only she’d come to her senses soon. Rambles things like ‘You’re the only pillar…’ in her half-dreamin’ state—makes no sense at all.”

“The police have not yet sent a single officer to question me at my residence.” “The reason I say this is that the very first people to notice the commotion were none other than the young live-in workers who came running upon hearing Madam Yashiroko’s shrill voice.” “The police apparently investigated the subsequent events in detail and then left... As for myself, I had already taken precautions beforehand—thinking I must not be suspected—so I asked Dr. Munechika to keep silent. But amidst the stroke of luck and great commotion, it became unclear who had gone to summon Dr. Munechika... and then came your unexpected inquiry, leaving me utterly astonished.” “I tell you...” “I have concealed nothing.” “If at all possible, could I ask that through your influence, Doctor, I not be summoned by the police again?” “As you can see, my back has given out—even the mere mention of the police makes me tremble by nature... I tell you...”

◆ Second Reference: Seidai-san Kisaragi-ji Chronicle

(Personal Notes of Founding Monk Ikkyō)

Note: The aforementioned temple is located at 24 Meihama-machi.

Related to the establishment by Kōtei, forty-ninth-generation ancestor of the Kure family—— Morning snow studded with golden radiance; by evening turns to turbid water and perishes in river and sea. Tonight’s blossoms of glory arrayed with silver candles; by dawn reduces to dust and debris, abandoned to the mud. The three realms are but crests upon waves; a lifetime, a rainbow in the midst of the sky—so it is said.

How much more so for those who form evil karma and never release it from moment to moment! In life, they dwell amidst hell’s vicissitudes, manifesting the visages of screaming demons and beasts; in death, they bequeath evil fruits to their descendants, maddening them through eternal karmic retribution’s torment. That dread, that suffering—to what can they be compared? To what can they be likened? Here, having observed this karmic causality and thoroughly investigated the principle of origin and end as thusness, he severed and realized the root [of suffering], transformed [his mind] into bodhicitta, erected a temple edifice to reverently adorn it with Buddha’s wisdom, and established it as a pure sanctuary where all humans and devas reverently make offerings through single-minded invocation of the Name. Tracing the origins of this founding legend: During the Keian era, in Yamashiro Province near the Gion vihara of the capital Kyoto, there existed a tea shop called Midoriya that had long stood in a bustling district frequented by nobles and commoners alike. They would annually select Uji’s finest teas to present to the imperial court, naming it “Gyokuro” to spread its renown nationwide. The household head was called Tsuboemon and had one son and three daughters. They named the boy Tsubotarou and cherished him beyond measure, but this youth, by nature disinclined toward commerce, from tender years studied under Ingen Zenji, the monk of Uji Ōbaku, surpassing even learned scholars. He mastered the Yagyū school of swordsmanship on one hand, drew from the Tosa school’s painting traditions, and adopted the Shōfū style of haikai poetry, thus creating a distinctive artistic style of his own. Upon reaching adulthood, he took the name Kūtsubo; yearning solely for mountains and rivers, he had no intention of succeeding the family. However, as he advanced in years and there being no other male heir, he was repeatedly compelled to marry; though he steadfastly refused on grounds of incomplete studies, there was no avoiding familial conflict. Finally, when he received Master Ingen’s edict at his father Tsuboemon’s behest, there came a complete change of heart,

“Until today, my twenty-fifth year, I had not heard the cuckoo’s cry.” Having inscribed this verse upon his family home’s gatepost, he departed his household, took monastic vows, entrusted himself to straw hat and staff, and for nearly a year explored noted sights and historic ruins while journeying westward—until at last he entered Hizen Karatsu via the Nagasaki Road. It was late April in the second year of Enpō [1674], and Kūtsubo was twenty-six years old. Kūtsubo toured the scenic beauty of this land with boundless admiration. Taking inspiration from Niji no Matsubara (Rainbow Pine Grove), he changed his name to Kōtei; selected eight scenic views, unfurling brush and paper; and resolved to personally engrave printing blocks to widely distribute it throughout the realm. Thus having stayed for over half a year, lured by the full moon of late autumn, he departed the traveler’s inn and ascended to Niji no Matsubara. The ancient pines of Niji no Matsubara, arrayed along silver waves and silver sands, revealed their full splendor within the pure moonlight, as though imbued with the heavenly grace of a master’s ink artistry. Having traveled one ri and passed through the fishing village of Hamasaki, his interest still had not waned. Having pursued the frost-flowing path another half-ri, he reached Ebisu's Cape; leaning against the rocky promontory, he gazed afar upon the bay's scenery while counting wild geese shadows until arriving at midnight's depth.

At that very moment, there appeared a woman. She appeared no more than sixteen years of age, fluttering her resplendent sleeves, her small white feet pitiable as she crossed the rugged rocky shore to approach Kōtei; unaware of any observers, she clasped her hands toward the west in prolonged prayer, then wiped her tears, gathered her sleeves, and made as if to cast herself into the sea. Startled, Kōtei rushed over and caught hold of her, led her to a spot of clean sand in the nearby pine grove, and began inquiring into her circumstances. The maiden at first did nothing but weep bitterly, but eventually began to speak: “I am Rokubijo, the only daughter of a certain Kure family residing in this place called Hamasaki. Our family served as leaders here for generations and prospered—but such is the way of this fleeting world, where fullness gives way to emptiness. Yet I must declare there exist terrifying karmic bonds in this world. Since ancient times, the bloodline of madness in our house has never ceased. Now I alone remain—sadly alive in this wretched state.”

“To explain how it all began, there exists an illustrated scroll passed down through generations in our family.” “Inside was depicted the nude figure of a beautiful woman.” “As I have learned through oral tradition, an ancestor of the Kure family—grieving over the death of his beloved wife—resolved to preserve her corpse’s likeness through vivid pigments, intending it as a memento in this fleeting world of lightning and morning dew. He began painting with all his heart, yet for reasons unknown, as he gazed upon her remains while working, the body decomposed before his eyes—rotting away until it became naught but a pile of white bones ere his brush had even reached halfway across the canvas.” “The master’s grief was not one-sided, until at last he fell into a state of madness; Ms. Kuregashi, the late wife’s younger sister, devotedly nursed him in every way possible, but her efforts proved futile, and ultimately she met the same fate as her sister.” “At that time, Ms. Kuregashi—the younger sister—was carrying the seed of that madman within her, her body already nearing the month of delivery; yet grieving this same sorrow, she soon stood on the verge of ending her life as well—though through various means they managed to prevent it, or so I have heard.”

Around that time, there appeared a visiting monk called Shōkū who had come down from the capital to restore the Buddhist statues at Kannon-ji Temple in Dazaifu, Chikuzen. After completing the restoration work and returning, during his pilgrimage he stopped by this area; upon hearing these details, he must have deemed it a pitiable matter. Having taken lodging at the Kure household and unrolled that scroll for inspection, he performed earnest sutra recitations before the Buddha to establish karmic bonds; thereafter, he felled the great sandalwood tree in the rear garden, selected its heartwood, personally carved a seated statue of Maitreya Bodhisattva, enshrined that illustrated scroll within its hollow core, installed it as the principal object of worship in the Kure family altar, and decreed that henceforth both altar maintenance and scroll viewing must be conducted solely by this household's women. He strictly forbade any male persons from approaching [the altar] under any circumstances and then departed.

Thereafter, the madman’s offspring—a son like unto a jewel—was safely born into this world, grew to take a wife, and succeeded to our family’s name; yet in accordance with Venerable Shōkū’s injunctions, none were permitted to approach the Buddhist altar. They had the wife alone manage the offerings of water and incense while she earnestly prayed for peace in this life and a favorable rebirth in the next. However, it must have been because they had inherited the blood of madness. When this man reached adulthood and sired several children, upon again encountering his wife’s premature death, he went mad and perished. In the generations that followed, among the male descendants, there were one or two individuals who would succumb to madness from time to time when faced with certain events. Their affliction was no ordinary one. They would attempt to murder women or desecrate women’s fresh graves with hoes and spades—committing nothing but perilous acts; and when people tried to stop them, they would kill or injure those very interveners, while also biting off their own tongues or strangling themselves to death—generation after generation without variation, reaching a truly dreadful extremity.

Given such circumstances, how could those who saw or heard not be filled with fear and dread? Some attributed it to a curse upon men who had glimpsed that illustrated scroll; others suspected defilement from impure women approaching that Buddha statue. Thus all—whether distant kin or near—came to shun marriage ties with our lineage, causing our bloodline to teeter on extinction time and again. They would sometimes employ gold and silver to burnish their name or seek individuals from distant lands to painstakingly continue their line, yet in recent years even the lowliest beggars would tremble in their tongues and quake in their bodies at mention of our family’s connections. “Now all my blood relatives have perished without exception, leaving me utterly alone,” she continued. “My two elder brothers succumbed most terribly—the eldest desecrated ancestral graves while madness gripped him; the second tried to stone me to death. After committing such horrors, both met untimely ends. As rumors swirled most fiercely then, most household members begged leave to depart. Even lifelong retainers could only sigh when they looked upon me.” Not a soul remained to speak with her—the desolation had reached its most pitiless extreme.

“At that very time, the senior retainer of the Karatsu domain—one Kumoi by name—having heard of this matter, decreed that his third son, a man called Kisaburou, should become my husband and succeed the family name.” “The male and female servants made such commotion in their joy—buzzing with excitement as if such an outcome had been unthinkable until now—but among them sat dejected the one person who had raised and protected me: my wet nurse, her countenance devoid of gladness. When I inquired into this peculiarity, she sighed and spoke thus:” “This is by no means joyous tidings to celebrate—but according to what my husband, who served at Lord Kumoi’s estate, inadvertently disclosed: Lord Kisaburou was an illegitimate son of Lord Kumoi, a master swordsman renowned as foremost in the domain. Yet from youth his conduct had been turbulent; after accompanying his father on official duty to Nagasaki, he became infatuated with Maruyama courtesans, consorted with unsavory men to destroy dojos here and there, extorted teahouses—committing every outrage until he had nowhere left to stand—and had now secretly returned to the domain.” “However, not only was there no one within our household willing to accept such a marriage proposal—being detested and feared like snakes and caterpillars—but upon hearing of our family’s circumstances, they issued this decree.” “Moreover, I have heard that their true ulterior motive was to use the senior retainer’s authority after the matter was settled to seize both the Kure family’s possessions and storehouses.” “Though I speak of fate, though I speak of powerlessness, when I consider the anguish of your future, my eyes grow dim and my heart feels as though it will vanish utterly,” she declared through flowing tears. “I too was utterly bewildered about what to do, yet being of frail constitution with no recourse, had grown anxious and desolate—when just this evening, after completing the autumn harvest and finding some semblance of calm, that Lord Kumoi Kisaburou presented himself unannounced at our household alone, without retainers or formal attire.”

Amidst the commotion, everyone scrambled in confusion; barely managing to hurriedly prepare food and drink, they ushered him into the inner parlor. Having adjusted my appearance, I approached the gathering—only to behold his form: one side of his face burned and festered like clods of earth, while the other half bore severed brows, eyes glaring white with lips twisted askew—truly resembling what one might call a demon’s visage. “Moreover, reeking of alcohol from wherever he had been drinking, his terrifying presence made my very body tremble uncontrollably.” “With great effort, I endured this and barely maintained composure as I rose to serve him drinks—yet before even a few cups had been poured, he seized my hand with his empty one.” “The moment I reflexively pulled back, causing the drink to spill onto his lap, he instantly flew into a drunken rage—striking down the wet nurse who tried to restrain him without even drawing his blade.” “I escaped amidst that chaos and somehow reached this place—but with my family’s unending misfortunes and my own wretched state offering no escape, I resolved only to end my life... until you intervened.” “Henceforth, I suppose I must become a nun.” “I suppose I must become a pilgrim.” “Though I know not from which land you hail, noble one,” she implored while prostrating herself upon the sand as though stifling her voice, “I beseech you—in your mercy above all else—to teach me the path forward.”

Having heard her out, Kōtei pondered the matter for some time; at length, he helped the maiden to her feet and spoke as follows: “Very well—I have a method. “Now, do not lament so.” Just as he began unrolling that illustrated scroll to clarify the karmic causes binding you, taking Rokubijo by the hand to depart, a brutish warrior with a half-demonic visage emerged from behind a pine tree and launched himself at Kōtei without a word. Kōtei, wielding the razor-sharp acuity of Zen training, pivoted his body to make the attacker slash at empty air while bellowing a thunderous shout. The warrior ran several paces through the void still gripping his naked blade, missed his footing at the cliff’s edge, and plunged into the moon-drenched sea below, vanishing in a plume of spray.

Thus Kōtei arrived at the Kure household accompanied by Rokubijo, and together with the household members retrieved the remains of her wet nurse. He personally conducted memorial services with sutra recitations and strictly forbade them from speaking of it to others. Having entered the Buddhist altar room and kept others at bay, he extracted that illustrated scroll from within the principal Maitreya Buddha statue. As he unrolled it with reverent worship, the sight of the beauty's decaying body—its pus-oozing visage—made every hair on his body stand rigid. Thereupon he sat before the Buddha, composed his spirit, and entered samādhi for over ten days. Then at the predawn hour of the last day of the eleventh month in Enpō's second year [1674], he suddenly opened his eyes and declared:

“To disperse the delusions of ordinary beings, nothing surpasses nenbutsu! Namu Amida! Namu Amida Butsu! Namu Amida! Namu Amida Butsu!!”

Having chanted in a resounding voice three times, he cast the aforementioned illustrated scroll into the nearby fire pit, reducing it to a wisp of smoke. Thus, Kōtei calmly emerged from seated meditation, gathered the family members, and declared: “Through spiritual power, I have succeeded in severing the Kure family’s evil karmic bonds. “I shall enshrine this ash within the Buddha statue to offer memorial rites alongside all souls of the three realms. Then, assuming secular form, I intend to become son-in-law to this household and implant its victorious fruits for ten thousand generations.” “...If any among you have objections, I shall set them aside and hear them without delay,” he had declared, yet not a single one voiced their thoughts, their demeanor showing they were solely fearful of reprisal from the Kumoi family, senior retainers of the domain. Kōtei, perceiving their hearts, warmly thanked the household members and granted them leave that very day, then sealed the residence and storehouses [declaring], “These shall be returned to the authorities.” He nailed a wooden placard boldly inscribed “Kure Heida,” had only gold, silver, and artworks loaded onto four packhorses bundled into towering loads, entrusted their leads to burly men, shouldered the Maitreya Buddha statue himself while tucking the Kure family lineage chart into his robe, took Rokubijo by the hand, and at dawn the following day departed from Hamasaki, setting his course eastward. At that very moment—the snow of the first day of the twelfth month in Enpō 2 [1674]—fluttered down as though embodying Rokubijo’s very name. The peerless scenery along five ri of winding shores and beaches transformed in an instant into an unbroken silver screen, making one wonder if Kōtei’s vibrant brush had painted it.

Having traveled approximately one ri, just as the eastern sky began to crimson, the clamor of many approaching voices rose from behind them. Kōtei turned to find twenty to thirty constables bearing seized items. Among them stood Kumoi Kisaburou—the half-demonic samurai who had plunged into the sea—now inexplicably revived. Adorned in a white headband, light armor, battle surcoat, and field trousers, he leveled his longsword and roared: “Halt, wicked monk! Move not from that spot!” “Previously I mistook you for the shogunate’s secret inspector and stayed my blade,” he bellowed. “But by domain order we’ve uncovered your true nature—posing as painter to survey castles, roaming provinces as false monk, plundering honorable houses, spiriting away children! Your villainy stands exposed beneath heaven! Leap to skies or burrow through earth—escape remains impossible! Behold men—this outlaw Heida who pillaged our domain!” “There cowers the woman-snatching monk!” When he thundered “Charge without mercy!”, his constables raised a unified cry and surged forward, snow swirling beneath their assault.

On one side loomed a towering cliff that soared halfway to the heavens. On another side was a precipitous cliff overlooking the sea where footing could not be secured. Behind them stood a delicate woman along with horses and attendants. Though escape seemed impossible, Kōtei showed not the slightest agitation. He handed the Buddha statue he had been carrying to a horseman, brushed the snow from his woven sedge hat and had Rokubijo hold it, planted his familiar bamboo staff firmly, adjusted his robes, fingered his rosary beads, and began calmly advancing back toward them—whereupon the constables, their expectations defied, appeared utterly overawed.

At that moment, Kōtei turned to face the multitude and performed a reverent bow while clearing his throat. “This humble one must express deepest gratitude for your arduous journey from afar—truly, your hardships are beyond measure,” he declared. “That your domain’s governance sees fit to dispatch such numbers to escort an unruly rogue—this merits sincere admiration, one must say.” “Yet since you’ve shown such gracious intent, might you escort me a little further—to yonder Chikuzen border?” “Thus would your duty conclude without impediment, spare us needless slaughter, and avert your domain’s disgrace.” “What say you to this proposal?” With a faint smile and clear voice—“I await your answer”—he left the entire group dumbstruck for some moments. Abruptly, Kumoi Kisaburou’s face flushed crimson. “You slit-mouthed wretch spouting nonsense!” “That time I may have been drunk and caught unawares, but today my blade shall know no rust!” “Charge, you lot! The foe stands alone!” “Slaughter all save the woman without compunction!” As he hammered his sword hilt—“Charge! Charge!”—the men who recalled their earlier fervor rallied, confronting what seemed but a helpless itinerant monk. Dismissing him as no threat, they drew ice-gleaming blades that caught the snow’s reflection and vied to strike first. With no alternative, Kōtei gripped his bamboo staff left-handed, parried the leader’s blade with an empty-handed flourish, swept aside oncoming swords, severed falling spiked clubs and tridents like arrows, maneuvering across the path’s full width to keep attackers from the horses—through countless blunt strikes and pressure-point blows, some collapsed unconscious while others writhed, tumbling into snow or plunging seaward until over a dozen had fallen in moments.

Against the unexpected martial skill of the traveling monk, even such a large force found themselves utterly outmatched and being driven back completely; Kumoi Kisaburou could no longer contain himself—"What insolent swordsmanship from this damned monk!" "Now then—let me demonstrate my new blade's keen edge and deliver final judgment upon this ill-fated encounter!" he declared, drawing his battlefield longsword to its full length. Assuming the blue-eyed stance without disrupting his footwork, he advanced sharply with the blade's tip pointed forward. What must Kōtei have thought? He cast aside the sword he had seized, lightly transferred the bamboo staff to his right hand, and met Kisaburou's blood-craving blade without yielding an inch—intercepting its advance like flowing water, pressing its retreat like biting frost—until even the renowned warrior's prized sword found itself trapped between immovable boulders, leaving him straining breathlessly while grinding his teeth in frustration. Kōtei observed this and smiled gently. "Well now, Kisaburou." "Have you attained enlightenment yet?" "The sharp sword of Amida Buddha resides in the spirit of this bamboo staff." "The unshakable bonds dwell within the rhythm of this compassion." "Even a blade refined a thousand times to perfection cannot surpass a single staff of enlightenment if it fails to transcend illusion and reality, life and death." "Behold this unfathomable mystery before your eyes! If you doubt me—discard your sword! Renounce wickedness and enter Buddha's path! Step into liberation where doubt never clouds moment-to-moment!" "If you refuse, I shall enact the principle of one life sacrificed for many—cutting you down to spare your domain disgrace!" "This instant marks life's final boundary—the agony of death's threshold!" "The very moment distinguishing heaven from hell!" As Kōtei pressed closer with each demand, even the indomitable Kisaburou turned pale—eyes bloodshot, panting through dripping sweat—yet his accumulated karmic power remained unspent. Perhaps seizing some subtle shift in momentum, he suddenly mustered heaven-piercing courage—raising his longsword overhead in a direct strike—and with elite precision came slashing down like lightning. Kōtei twisted aside to evade while delivering a crushing counterblow. The bamboo staff's edge never wavered. When it struck Kisaburou's forehead, he reeled back dizzily—Kōtei pressed into the opening left by his parry, seizing the dagger at Kisaburou's waist as if claiming rightful ownership. "Then I shall act as I choose!" he declared—though before the words fully escaped his lips, Kisaburou had already retreated six feet. Yet as the samurai swung up his blade once more, he arched backward into empty air and collapsed thunderously like a felled Buddha statue. From his right shoulder—cleaved open in a grand sweeping arc—blood gushed forth, staining the snow crimson as he breathed his last.

They must have been terrified by this momentum. The remaining ones had fled far away, with no pursuers left in sight. Now at ease, Kōtei returned the dagger he had taken to the corpse, pressed his palms together while fingering his rosary beads, and chanted a Buddhist prayer several times. Then, brushing the snow from his black robes, he shouldered the Buddha statue as if to say *Let us go*, comforted Rokubijo who seemed devoid of mind, tilted his sedge hat, and urged the party onward. Before long, they entered Chikuzen Province, lodged overnight in a place called Fukae, and at dawn the next day trudged eastward through snow that still fell for another five *ri* until they arrived at this Niehama and ceased their journey.

Kōtei observed the features of this place and thought: To the north, Atago’s sacred mountain towered halfway to the heavens, while to the south, it linked through clouds and mist to the renowned peaks of Seburi, Raizan, and Ukibuse. The vast expanse of the Toyota Meguri fields stretched far into the distance, sufficient to nourish descendants for countless generations, while the clear waters of the Murasakigawa River proved suitable for floating ceremonial cups. Strategically situated near the scenic spots of Niehama—the historic site of Odo, Keya, and Iku no Matsubara—all lay not far from the Kuroda clan’s 550,000-koku castle town. Truly, it gathered the quintessence of mountains, seas, and terrain. Thus he nurtured the horsemen who had followed him into becoming household retainers, sought fields to build dwellings and storehouses, and while opening communications with his homeland capital to lay eternal plans, he selected a site to gather giant timbers from Raizan and Seburi mountains. He personally oversaw the measurements as he erected a grand temple complex, enshrining the seated Maitreya Bodhisattva statue he had carried as its principal image—intending to establish it as a family temple for posterity and a perpetual site of supplication through all ages. When the mountain gate towered high to welcome the moon of true suchness, and when the temple halls with their linked roof tiles sent forth visions of the Buddha land’s golden sun... The groves stood deep and secluded, with waters of azure lapping at shores of white sand; birds sang, fish leapt, and devotees chanted invocations to the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha—truly it seemed a miraculous wonder of this degenerate age, an unparalleled pure land.

Thus,

When the work reached completion in early Eleventh Month of the fifth year of Enpo (1677), Fire Serpent year, under Emperor Reigen—the 111th sovereign of Japan—the head temple in the capital summoned this humble monk, seeking to appoint him as founding abbot. This humble monk repeatedly declined on account of his limited knowledge and shallow learning, but they would not heed. Finally moved by its extraordinary nature, he descended with his traveling pack to assume the abbotship, naming the temple Seidai-san Kisaragi-ji. Then, having divined an auspicious hour on the twenty-first day of the second month of Enpo 6 (1678), the Year of Earth Horse, he conducted lectures on the Seven Gates of the Ojō Kōshiki ritual, recited the Three Pure Land Sutras, and performed a grand seven-day memorial service and Segaki ceremony. On that day, Kōtei himself ascended the seat, briefly explained the preceding circumstances to the audience in a penitent address, and recited two waka poems.

Chanting: The Six Realms—now shall I not stray; the six-character sacred name. The kure bamboo staff in the Buddha’s realm　　　　　　　　　　　Tsubotarou Waka: Layering generations of kure bamboo for the Buddha’s realm... I shall soon return to the path of emptiness　　　　　Rokubijo Then this humble monk ascended the seat, meticulously expounded the karmic causality of the temple’s origins, elucidated the principles of transmigration through the Six Realms and reincarnation, imparted the ultimate truth that "a single-minded invocation of Amida Buddha instantly eradicates infinite sin," and finally composed a verse: With single-minded invocation of the Name, merit echoes through ten thousand ages; Seidai-san Temple’s bell welcomes the moon of true suchness.

Moreover, Rokubijo was eighteen years old at the time, and it is said that she had already copied the six-character sacred name onto thirty thousand sheets of paper; when she distributed these to the gathered attendees of the ceremony, they were completely exhausted in less than three days.

Such a story manifests the bustle of the Six Realms within this Saha world and turns the principles of karmic retribution before one's very eyes. Understand that earthly desires are enlightenment itself—the six sensory defilements are the Pure Land. The posthumous blessings of the Kure ancestors and their karmic bonds leading to supreme perfect enlightenment for future generations truly know no bounds. Should any man or woman born into the Kure lineage in generations to come wish to repay this profound benevolence, let them deeply engrave this truth in their hearts and never neglect Buddhist rituals and nembutsu invocations. This matter must never be disclosed to outsiders; should it inadvertently be revealed, there remains fear of incurring grudges from neighboring domains. Let this secret be confined solely to the temple's presiding abbot at that time and the head of the Kure household with his wife. Anken.

Enpo 7, Seventh Month, Seventh Day - Recorded in a single line.

◆ Third Reference: Statement by Mr. Nomiyama Horin

▼ Time of Interview: Around 3 PM on the aforementioned day

▼ Location of Interview: At the Abbot's Quarters of Kisaragi Temple

▼ Attendees: Mr. Nomiyama Horin (head priest of the same temple, seventy-seven years old at the time; died August of the same year)

I (Mr. W)—the aforementioned two individuals— “Your honorable doubt is indeed most justified. As this temple chronicle’s main text records—over a hundred years ago, Lord Kōtei, whom we might call the restorer of the Kure lineage, burned that illustrated scroll entirely to ashes and sealed it away until the advent of Maitreya’s era. Yet through what means did it regain its original form as a scroll and manifest in this present age? How did it come into Lord Kure Ichirou’s possession to become the seed of such unseemly madness?... Regarding this matter, truthfully, even had you not inquired, I would have wished to present it for your wise judgment.”

“Originally, this temple chronicle document—as we refer to it—was established such that when the master and his wife succeeding to the Kure family name made their first grave visit, all others would be dismissed for them to view it. Furthermore, all matters pertaining to the honorable Kure bloodline—beyond common knowledge—were never to be disclosed to outsiders, as it had been ordained since the time of Founding Monk Ikkō Shōnin that maintaining this secrecy constituted the fundamental duty of this temple’s head priests. However, given the unavoidable nature of your esteemed inquiry—and particularly as discerning whether Lord Kure Ichirou suffers genuine madness or mere pretense marks the boundary between his becoming a criminal or not—how could I possibly conceal anything…?”

“The reason I bring this up is none other than... There existed someone who had long ago ascertained that the illustrated scroll—which should have been reduced to ashes within our principal Buddha image’s abdomen—remained preserved in its original form. Moreover, I am distinctly aware of whom I believe to be none other than that very individual who extracted the scroll from the sacred effigy’s womb, thereby precipitating Lord Kure Ichirou’s mental affliction.” “I must stress this stems solely from my own conjectures—a matter that may astonish any listener—but it concerns none other than Lady Chiyoko, Lord Ichirou’s birth mother, who met an unnatural demise in Nōgata years past... Indeed... This seems an unconscionable tale, for above all else, one cannot conceive of a mother so merciless as to pass such dread-laden heirloom to her own irreplaceable child. Yet I suspect profound circumstances underlie this act, and thus if Your Honor would but hear the account I shall now relate, all will soon become clear.”

“Let me see now… It must have been twenty years ago… No… Perhaps closer to thirty years now.” “It is indeed an old matter.” “Whether you’re already aware I cannot say, but this Lady Chiyoko—from earliest childhood she possessed uncommon cleverness and invention in all matters, with particular dexterity in handiwork. Her skills in painting and embroidery were said to be especially remarkable. Even during her girlhood years when she still wore long-sleeved kimonos and went by ‘Kappā-san,’ I would often see her sitting primly alone in some corner of this temple’s main hall, copying the four-season floral patterns from the sliding doors or the carvings of heavenly beings on the transoms.” “Even then she had those utterly adorable, doll-like features…”

“However, I believe it was when she reached around fourteen or fifteen years of age. It appeared to be after school dismissal when Lady Chiyoko, wearing maroon hakama trousers and carrying a cloth-wrapped bundle, entered these abbot’s quarters. She approached me as I sat drinking tea alone and said... ‘Reverend... They say there’s a beautiful illustrated scroll inside that jet-black Buddha statue over there... Could you quietly show it to me?’... Such was her request.” “The matter of this scroll has been a renowned tale in these parts ever since the grand memorial service at this temple’s founding, so there should be many in this village who know of it—perhaps you heard it from one of them?... At that time, I laughed... ‘It was reduced to ashes long ago, so I cannot show it to you now,’ I told her... Yet when I shook that Buddha statue just moments ago, there came a rattling sound from its abdomen.” “There must surely be something inside...” Lady Chiyoko said. “I was startled... She would never do such a thing.” “I warned her, ‘Divine punishment will strike...’ But... after Lady Chiyoko had left and I found myself utterly alone, such anxiety overcame me that I stealthily went to the main hall. Though it felt sacrilegious, when I shook the principal image of Maitreya Buddha vigorously—indeed, there came a rattling sound.” The sensation gave the distinct impression that something shaped like a scroll must be housed inside...

"I was so astonished by this extraordinary turn of events that my very chest seemed to roar. 'I had firmly believed that the principal image’s abdomen contained nothing but the ashes of the burned illustrated scroll, exactly as recorded in this chronicle’s main text... However, at that moment I began to consider—might this not be that long ago Lord Kōtei had feigned burning the scroll while in truth preserving it intact within the Buddha statue?' 'Might it not be that the packing material around it dried and loosened over the years, causing it to produce such sounds?' Might it not be that—as would be natural for an art lover—he could not bear to destroy the illustrated scroll, and thus arranged this himself? That through conducting memorial services over years, the karmic ties would gradually fade and the curse extinguish itself? 'Should it then have been taken out and burned anew?' I could not help but entertain various thoughts—'What should be done?' and the like—but even so, there seemed to be aspects I could not quite reconcile, and feeling an eerie dread, I concluded that surely no one would be so brazen as to break open the principal image’s sacred body to inspect its interior... and thus left matters as they were."

“However, in the midst of this—for time passes swiftly—when last autumn arrived, on the evening before the equinox, Lady Yashiro, Lord Ichirou, and Miss Omoyo appeared together to clean the graves. At that time, while Lady Yashiro was cleaning the mortuary alone, she stopped by these abbot’s quarters and drank tea. Amidst various topics of conversation… though it may still be somewhat early, she proposed: ‘Once Ichirou graduates from Ropponmatsu School [Fukuoka High School] next spring, I intend to have him wed Moyoko immediately—what do you think?’ Lady Yashiro had always consulted me before making such announcements, so I had responded that it was truly an excellent plan. When the two of us then stood and went out to the main hall’s veranda, there we could see Lord Ichirou—still in his school uniform after finishing the cleaning—and Miss Omoyo with her red obi tied, sitting cozily side by side with their hands pressed together in prayer before the graveyard beside the temple gate. Upon seeing this, Lady Yashiro seemed overcome with emotion—hurriedly covering her face as she retreated toward the mortuary—while I remained behind. Watching the two of them, so perfectly matched in appearance, I found myself idly pondering the future of the Kure household when suddenly, quite unexpectedly, I recalled matters concerning Lady Chiyoko from two decades prior—and involuntarily gasped. To be sure, at that time—though I did not dwell on it being perhaps an old man’s unnecessary fretting—it seems the matter still weighed on my mind, for when night fell, I found myself utterly unable to sleep.”

“So I slowly rose... Relying on moonlight streaming through the window and lamplight’s glow, I went alone to the main hall. Though it felt sacrilegious, I placed both hands upon the principal image and shook it—yet not a trace remained of the distinct sound I had heard before. ...Does it not feel as though the contents have become hollow?” At that moment—as if some premonition had warned me—I was overcome by inexplicable dread. “Nevertheless, mustering resolve, I lifted the principal image from its shrine and brought it to these quarters. When I examined it thoroughly through spectacles—though thick dust obscured details—I found the statue’s neck jointed at the collar, coming loose when shaken forcefully.” In that instant, I understood. Suppressing my pounding heart, I carried it silently along the corridor to the earthen floor, dusted it soundlessly, then returned. Beneath electric light on a felt mat, I pulled the statue’s neck from its joint. At the hollowed base shaped like a sutra cylinder lay ash wrapped in aged Chinese paper—its center indented with a scroll spindle’s precise form. “When I saw this, though Lord Kōtei claimed to have burned the scroll, there must have been deeper intent.” “The truth is clear—it was preserved intact, then stolen... Beyond doubt now.” “Yes... Beyond old packing cotton, not a paper scrap remains... Come this way.” “I shall show you the principal image.” = See Remarks in Subsequent Section =

“As you can see... Whether this should be called my negligence or... Ah... How many times I agonized, praying no calamity would occur... “Yet conversely—if we consider that Lady Chiyoko did take it—what possible necessity could there have been for such an act? “And after she met such an end in Nōgata, who could have kept it concealed until today? “Had Lady Yashiro—who attended to Lady Chiyoko’s remains—discovered it, she would surely have informed me without fail... Yet as I turned this over in my mind, these recent events transpired, leaving me no recourse but to declare it a mystery surpassing both heart and words... “...It has come to my understanding that following Lord Ichirou’s fit of madness, the illustrated scroll’s whereabouts became unknown—this too stands as yet another enigma... “Among the villagers, some claim to have witnessed the scroll undulating like a serpent through the void both before and after Lord Ichirou’s derangement... What meaning can we find in this? “All this stems from my negligence—the torment of Lady Omoyo meeting her demise and Lord Ichirou being driven to madness... “If only I could exchange my own dwindling life for theirs... I am left utterly drowned in tears...”

◆ Fourth Reference: Summary of Kure Yashiroko’s Testimony

▼ Same Day, Around 5:00 PM Prior to Scheduled Testimony Time

▼ Testimony Location: Inner Chamber of the Same Residence

▼ Attendees: Kure Yashiroko, myself (W)—the above two persons—

“Oh Doctor… You’ve finally come.” “How I’ve waited… No, no.” “My injuries mean nothing.” “I need neither life nor anything else.” “Please—I beg you—find the fiend who stole this scroll from the temple (... withdrawing [it] from her tightly secured bosom and thrusting it forward)... who lay in wait at that quarry to give it to Ichirou... who plotted to slaughter everyone in this household! Find them without fail!” “And once that wretch is found—just one question will suffice—(sobbing) I implore you, ask why they committed such cruelty—just one question! (sobbing)... How I rue—how bitterly I rue—not uncovering that villain while Ichirou still had his wits... Were I to know now, even grinding their bones to meal wouldn’t sate me! (sobbing)... No, no.” “When we retrieved her from Nōgata, no such thing existed.” “I’ve examined every corner of Ichirou’s affairs… What could those police fools possibly grasp?” “To think they subjected Ichirou to such barbarity... I couldn’t even answer their questions... I’ve relinquished all hope.” “Whether Ichirou regains his senses or not, whether my daughter revives or not, I care not what becomes of my life.” “The sworn foe of my sister Chiyoko, Ichirou, and my daughter is one and the same demon... The one who knew full well about this scroll yet showed it to Ichirou... (Her agitation peaks, collapsing into incoherence.)” Thereafter, approximately one week later, while gradually regaining composure, she began exhibiting trance-like tendencies.)

◆ Remarks: (i) At 10:30 AM on the day of the incident, upon examining the interior of the Kure family storehouse (referred to as the Third Storehouse), which had been closed to entry, imprints of Kure Ichirou's magnolia-soled clogs and Moyoko's red cork sandals worn for outings were found neatly aligned on old newspapers spread across the entrance to the downstairs wooden floor, with candle drippings originating beside them dotting all the way up the steep staircase. No signs of struggle, resistance, distress, or similar indications were observed regarding the situation on the upper floor or the victim's corpse.

The corpse’s neck exhibited overlapping ligature marks with congestion and other binding grooves intertwined; however, no external damage could be detected to the trachea, larynx, or carotid arteries. Furthermore, one new Western-style handkerchief bearing the scent of face powder had fallen beneath the desk placed before the corpse; this item was recognized as belonging to the perpetrator and having been used in the violent act. In the center of the desk lay what appeared to be tissue paper, with over a dozen sheets of paper folded into quarters—bearing a woman’s bodily scent—spread beneath it. At the far left edge stood one of the household’s ritual implements: a brass candlestick holding a single 100-monme candle that bore signs of having been lit. Subsequent examination estimated it had burned for approximately two hours and forty minutes before being extinguished.

Furthermore, three new 100-monme candles along with a box of matches had been placed beneath the desk; of these four candles in total, the numerous fingerprints found on their upper and central areas were exclusively those from each finger of the victim Moyoko’s left and right hands, with not a single one belonging to the perpetrator Kure Ichirou. Moreover, given that only the victim’s fingerprints were detected on the matchbox, there remained no room for doubt that the aforementioned four candles had been brought by the victim herself, who struck a match herself to light one of them and placed it at the left end of the desk. (Other details concerning Yashiroko’s footprints and related matters omitted.)

(2) At 9:00 PM that same night, the victim’s corpse arrived at the Kyushu Imperial University Faculty of Medicine Department of Forensic Medicine, where I (W) immediately performed the autopsy under the supervision of Medical Scholar Dr. Funaki. By 11:00 PM, the procedure concluded, determining the cause of death to be compression of the neck—strangulation. Moreover, it was presumed that after losing consciousness due to an unspecified cause, the victim had been strangled. Furthermore, no abnormalities were observed in the hymen. (Other details omitted.)

◆ Remarks: (A) Upon investigating the seated statue of Maitreya Bodhisattva—principal image of Kisaragi Temple—it exhibited an oversized head relative to its diminutive body and an uncanny visage, lacking both halo and traditional monastic robe draped over one shoulder. It wore a neck-hanging kesa resembling ordinary clerical vestments, sat in full lotus position forming Maitreya’s mudra, yet bore stylistic features suggesting it might represent its creator’s self-portrait. The overall carving technique displayed striking simplicity and vigor throughout its execution, with sawtooth and undulating chisel marks evident across all surfaces. At the base’s center, two characters reading “Shōkū” had been incised using an exceptionally solemn carving method, each measuring approximately one sun square.

(B) The central hollow space formed a cylindrical shape measuring one shaku in vertical depth and approximately three sun and three bu in horizontal diameter. When subtracting the thickness of the cotton packed at the top and bottom along with the ash layer, the remaining height measured just over one shaku and six bu—precisely matching the volume of the illustrated scroll (separate reference item). Furthermore, traces of adhesive remained visible on the square base at the root of the neck serving as its lid. (C) Upon examining the Chinese-style paper that had wrapped the ashes and what appeared to be cotton packed around it on all sides, we recognized that their patina of age roughly corresponded to the recorded period. Microscopic analysis of the ashes revealed traces of ordinary Japanese paper and silk cloth having been burned, and nothing more. Traces of gold thread used for mounting, wood that should have been used for the scroll axis, or any other such materials were completely absent (other details omitted).

◆ Remarks: (1) An investigation of the quarry area at the base of the mountain along the national highway entrance at Meihama, on the coastal side, revealed that the stone upon which Kure Ichirou had reportedly sat viewing the illustrated scroll the previous day was situated in the shadow of leftover rough stones—a location unlikely to attract the attention of those passing along the highway. (2) Within the quarry were found countless stone fragments and boulders of varying sizes, traces of stonemasons’ work, and miscellaneous debris such as straw, paper, straw sandals, horseshoe fragments, and other similar items scattered in from the highway—but no artifacts of particular note were identified. Furthermore, perhaps due to having been washed by light rain, no footprints resembling those of Kure Ichirou or any other individuals could be identified.

(3) Wakano Gunpei—a stonemason who ordinarily worked at said location and resided at Meihama Town 75-1—along with his wife Mitsu and adopted son Kakui, had developed abdominal pain and diarrhea since two days prior, leading them to be suspected of having contracted an epidemic and having their movements restricted. Shortly after their recovery, upon synthesizing testimonies obtained from the two individuals, it was concluded that they had no memory of any suspicious individuals entering the quarry or loitering nearby during their recent work periods. Furthermore, regarding the epidemic among the aforementioned individuals, since the fish and similar items in that area were always fresh, causes such as food poisoning could not be considered. In the end, it was attributed to an unknown pathogen.

―――――――――――――――――――

◇ Matter Concerning the Insertion of the Illustrated Scroll’s Photographic Plate

◇ Matter Concerning the Entry of the Aforementioned Illustrated Scroll’s Origin Account ◇ Matter Concerning the Entry of Observation and Research Items Throughout the Entirety of the Second Episode

×　　　　　　　　　　×　　　　　　　　　　×

“Ha ha ha ha….”

“…Well, gentlemen? Were you taken aback, eh?”

You’ve probably completely forgotten while reading that this constitutes the most crucial part of my will—or so I might say. There’s tragedy. There’s comedy. There’s swordplay. There’s something colossal. Throw in some publicity-seeking opportunists, and you’ve got records bizarre and outrageous enough to make you gasp in awe and gape in shock—quite the spectacle, I assure you. What truly beggars belief is how psychological heredity manifests here with unprecedented audacity throughout history—so brazen that even if you combed through every last one of modernity’s so-called common sense manuals and scientific cheat sheets, you’d still be left utterly defenseless. Even that peerless forensic luminary Dr.Wakabayashi Kyōtarō seemed to flounder with this case, judging by the sigh he let slip in his investigative papers: It states—

I dared to designate the perpetrator of this case as a hypothetical perpetrator. For this reason, one could only imagine the perpetrator of this case as a being of fearsome divine metamorphosis and unfathomable nature—one who transcended all modern academic knowledge, not to mention every moral code, custom, obligation, and human sentiment—leaving no room for alternative conjecture. Thus, despite having perpetrated cruelty of such magnitude—destroying a family’s bloodline beyond revival within a mere two years by killing three women and driving one young man to madness—the means of executing these atrocities had been either disguised as coincidences or cloaked in supernatural phenomena beyond scientific understanding, permitting no other speculation. The existence of a perpetrator was self-evident, yet even the existence of any consistent purpose behind such crimes became doubtful… et cetera.

…And…

Now then, what do you think? By now, those of you who compared the previously disclosed records with these statements must have realized long ago. The core assertions regarding this case—those of Dr. Wakabayashi from his forensic medicine standpoint and my own as a psychiatrist—had been diametrically opposed since the incident's outbreak, remaining unaligned to this very day... That is to say, through his forensic specialist's lens, Dr. Wakabayashi maintains there must absolutely be another hidden perpetrator behind this case. Whereas Dr. Wakabayashi had from the outset determined this to be a scenario where some perpetrator must be pulling strings from somewhere—manipulating all mysterious phenomena related to this case while obscuring them from public view—I found such an approach utterly untenable. From mental science's perspective, this constitutes what we call a 'criminal case without a perpetrator.' The violent act amounts to nothing more than a manifestation of psychiatric disorder—bizarre in both form and substance—where victim and perpetrator alike became one under shared delusion. If you still insist on requiring a perpetrator, then I maintain we should arrest the ancestors who genetically transmitted this psychology to Kure Ichirou and throw them in jail. Therein lies this case's central intrigue...

“Huh... Wh-wh-what did you say... Sh-shivering... Have you already identified the true culprit behind this case...?”

No... This was truly astonishing. No matter how renowned a detective one may be，having such keen mental agility proves troublesome. Firstly，I and Wakabayashi would end up losing our livelihoods.

“Now now, let us not rush ahead—wait patiently, if you will.” “Even if this person you gentlemen pursue were indeed the definitive culprit of this case—Dr.Wakabayashi’s so-called hypothetical phantom perpetrator—it remains ultimately mere conjecture, devoid of any conclusive evidence.” “Moreover, even were you to possess irrefutable evidence—knowing exactly where this perpetrator resides and what they are doing at this very moment—and were to apprehend and interrogate them thoroughly, only to then uncover beneath the surface of this case some shocking new fact that leaves you speechless… what precisely would you propose to do?” “Heh heh heh heh....”

That was precisely why I hadn’t spoken of it. It was absolutely dangerous—strictly forbidden—to judge such a profoundly mysterious incident through trivial evidence and conceptual reasoning. At minimum, one had to observe how this incident, after erupting in its aforementioned state, had slithered stickily into my hands through what path. One had to consider what observations I had made, by what methods I had advanced my research’s footsteps, and furthermore, how the explanation of the second episode’s contents—uncovered through said research—stood as something ghastly, scathing, dazzling, bizarre, and utterly nonsensical in the extreme. Moreover, unless one thoroughly observed how such a research process could have abruptly transformed and progressed to become the very cause of my suicide… the presence or absence of a perpetrator could not be determined. “Ah… So that was how it was… Hmm—” I would first prepare you to be dazzled by such reactions… Now then, I was to proceed—without any “if you pleases”—to explain the actual progression of my research into this case hereafter, as though continuing a natural color embossed film.

Now then, if one were to remove those polite "gozaimasu" flourishes from the spiel of a country bumpkin film narrator like myself—and a greenhorn one at that—it would likely end up sounding like some amateur's screenplay recitation. I must confess I've never dabbled in crafting screenplays or Chinese cuisine, so their finer points escape me. But with dawn still hours away and time aplenty remaining, I thought I might indulge in one last jest of this lifetime by attempting to wrestle with that so-called screenplay. Let me reiterate for clarity: structuring this account like Chinese cuisine—no, a screenplay—by shunting aside the core matter of psychological heredity and instead layering outward facts inward one by one isn't some clever wordplay about chaotic mixtures. These records of mine concerning the case are all arrayed precisely as events first entered my field of vision—so much so that simply studying their sequence should reveal the greater truth of the incident... On this point, immodest though it may sound, I maintain they constitute an impeccably scientific record—untainted by falsehoods and unashamed before heaven and earth... Or so I would claim... Hmm... Ah well.

[Subtitle] Kure Ichirou’s Psychiatric Evaluation: May 3, 1926, 9:00 AM, at the Fukuoka District Court Reception Room.

[Film] Dr. Masaki was dressed like a village headman in a yokan-brown crested haori, thin silk summer kimono, twill hakama, and bleached-white tabi socks. He leaned back in a chair near the window opposite the entrance, leisurely puffing on a cigar.

On the central round table lay what appeared to be Dr. Masaki’s old Western umbrella and a discarded Koyamataka. Beside them, Dr. Wakabayashi, dressed in a frock coat, stood rigidly as he introduced an imposing uniformed inspector and a well-proportioned gentleman clad entirely in serge to Dr. Masaki. “Inspector Ōtsuka… Judge Suzuki… Both of whom have been involved in this case from the very beginning…” Dr. Masaki stood up, received the two name cards, and bobbed his head in an utterly casual manner.

“I am Masaki, who has come forth summoned by your esteemed request… Though regrettably, I do not possess a business card…” The Inspector and the Judge straightened their decorum even further and returned the bow. Just then, Kure Ichirou—wearing only a single indigo-patterned lined kimono against his bare skin—was led in by two court officers with a rope around his waist, whereupon the three gentlemen parted to either side and took up positions attending Dr. Masaki.

Kure Ichirou stood motionless before them, his clouded eyes of melancholy slowly sweeping across the room with deliberate thoroughness. The pale skin of his arms and neck bore numerous scratches and bruises from having been forcibly restrained during violent struggles, their presence rendering his otherwise peerlessly handsome visage all the more unnaturally striking. From behind him, the two court attendants simultaneously raised their hands in salute. Dr. Masaki acknowledged their gesture with a nod of his eyes as he completed a prolonged exhalation of cigar smoke. Without ceremony, he seized both of Kure Ichirou's manacled wrists and drew him near until their faces stood approximately one foot apart, aligning their pupils with exacting precision. His gaze seemed to probe the very depths of those pupils as though imparting some unspoken suggestion—or perhaps repelling the light in Kure's eyes with his own penetrating stare, compressing it back into the dark recesses of those ocular cavities... Thus they remained frozen in ocular confrontation, neither man moving a muscle for what felt an eternity.

Gradually, Dr. Masaki's expression grew tense... The expressions of the gentlemen in attendance likewise tensed in response. Yet among them, only Dr. Wakabayashi remained utterly still—not a single eyebrow twitching—as he coolly lowered his pale eyes and fixedly stared at Dr. Masaki’s profile. As if secretly searching for something within Dr. Masaki’s expression... But Kure Ichirou remained unperturbed. With the clear gaze characteristic of someone who had lost their sanity, he effortlessly shifted his eyes away from Dr. Masaki’s face and then slowly looked up from below at the tall frock-coated figure of Dr. Wakabayashi standing rigidly beside him.

Dr. Masaki's expression visibly softened. While looking at Kure Ichirou’s cheek, he smiled, puffed on his dwindling cigar, and spoke in a casual tone. “Do you know that man...?” Kure Ichirou kept looking up at Dr. Wakabayashi’s pale, elongated face as he gave a slight nod. His eyes took on a dreamlike gaze... Seeing this, Dr. Masaki’s smile deepened further. At that moment, Kure Ichirou’s lips twitched.

“……I know.” “He is my father.” ……And…… Yet the terrifying transformation in Dr. Wakabayashi’s expression as these words were uttered—whether fully spoken or not—… His already pallid face drained of color until his forehead lost its luster like chalk, two blue veins bulging and writhing from its center as though crawling forth. No sooner had his face contorted into a visage defying categorization as either rage or shock than he began trembling—temples twitching—as he spun toward Dr. Masaki. With a ferocious glare that seemed ready to lunge and bite…

However, Dr. Masaki paid no heed to such matters and burst into uproarious laughter, heedless of his surroundings. “Ha ha ha ha.” “So your father’s settled, then……Then do you know who this man is?” As he said this, he pointed at his own nose. Kure Ichirou continued staring intently at Dr. Masaki’s face as before, but before long, his lips twitched. “……Father……you are……” “Ah hah hah hah hah hah hah hah!”

Dr. Masaki looked even more amused… Finally releasing Kure Ichirou’s hand, he burst into utterly uncontrollable laughter. “Ah hah hah hah hah!” “Well, I’m astonished!” “So you have two fathers, then?” Kure Ichirou hesitated unthinkingly but soon nodded silently. Dr. Masaki doubled over holding his stomach.

“Wah hah hah hah!” “Absolutely splendid!” “Unparalleled absurdity! … Then do you remember the names of those two fathers of yours?” When Dr. Masaki uttered this in a half-joking manner, the faces of the assembled people—who until then had seemed disoriented as if engulfed in smoke—suddenly tensed with unease all at once. However, when posed this question, Kure Ichirou’s expression abruptly darkened. He quietly averted his gaze and appeared to stare unwaveringly at the clear May sky shining brilliantly beyond the window, but soon—as if recalling something—tears pooled in his large eyes. Watching this, Dr. Masaki once again took Kure Ichirou’s hand and leisurely exhaled a puff of cigar smoke.

“No need. “That’s enough. “There’s no need to force yourself to remember your fathers’ names. “Whichever you remember first would create terrible unfairness. “Ha ha ha ha ha!”

The people who had been gripped by an uncanny tension burst into laughter in unison. Dr. Wakabayashi, who had finally regained his usual composure, forced a rigid smile that seemed on the verge of tears. Kure Ichirou surveyed each laughing face with meticulous care before eventually sighing in apparent disappointment and lowering his gaze, tears spilling forth. The teardrops scattered from his handcuffs onto the grimy floor.

While holding that hand, Dr. Masaki casually surveyed the people’s faces. "In any case, I wish to take custody of this patient. What say you?" "I believe some memory pertaining to the incident’s truth remains within this patient’s mind." "As you have just heard, his perception of all faces as paternal may well manifest crucial psychology hinting at this incident’s hidden truth... If possible, I should like to employ my own methods to restore this young man’s mind and extract memories concerning the incident’s truth... What say you?"

[Caption] The first day Kure Ichirou appeared in the Liberation Therapy Field (July 7, 1926 [Taisho 15] filming)

[Film] The vivid green leaves of five or six paulownia trees standing in the center of the Liberation Therapy Field fluttered and glistened in the midsummer light. From the eastern entrance, eight madmen formed a line and filed in one after another. Among them were some who looked around curiously at their surroundings, but soon each began their own various mad antics.

At the very end, Kure Ichirou entered. With an utterly melancholic and lonely expression, he vacantly looked around at the brick walls encircling him and the sand at his feet for a while—but then, as if suddenly discovering something in the sand beneath him, his eyes glistened sharply. He picked it up, rolled it between his hands, and held it up to the blinding sun. It was a blue, beautiful ramune marble. Kure Ichirou grinned as he faced the sun directly, rolled the marble into his black heko obi, then hastily tucked up the hem of his garment and crouched forward, beginning to dig through the scorching sand with both hands in vigorous, scraping motions.

Dr. Masaki, who had been standing at the entrance from the beginning and watching this scene, ordered a janitor to bring a single hoe and gave it to Kure Ichirou. Kure Ichirou bowed repeatedly with evident delight as he received the hoe, then began digging into the glinting sand with several times the fervor he had shown before. As this happened, wherever the wet sand was exposed to sunlight, it began drying white from one end.

Dr. Masaki, who had been intently watching this behavior, soon smirked and nodded while briskly departing toward the entrance.

[Caption] Kure Ichirou in the Liberation Therapy Field approximately two months later (September 10, 1926 [Taisho 15] filming)

[Film] In the center of the Liberation Therapy Field, scattered patches of withered leaves could be seen on the paulownia trees. Around it, across the flat ground of the field, pitch-black areas where sand had been dug up like grave holes overlapped and lay scattered here and there. In a corner of the sandy flat between the holes, Kure Ichirou stood upright, using the hoe as a staff as he stretched his back and let out a pained breath. His face was deeply tanned from the autumn sun and he appeared utterly exhausted from days of labor, now so gaunt as to be unrecognizable, with only his eyes gleaming restlessly. Sweat streamed ceaselessly; his heaving breath burned like flames… Above all, the blade of the hoe he leaned on—worn thin into undulating waves and gleaming silver—bore stark witness to the frenzied, relentless sand-digging labor of dozens of days. This was the visage of a living corpse plunged into purgatory.

Kure Ichirou soon took up the hoe again with his pitch-black arms, as if pursued by someone. He thrust into the new quartz-sand flat to begin digging another hole, but upon unearthing a large fish vertebra, he suddenly regained vigor and continued swinging the hoe with twice his former intensity. A dance-crazed female student fell into one of the large holes behind Kure Ichirou and let out a scream while flailing both legs in the air. The other patients clapped their hands and cheered.

Yet Kure Ichirou kept digging single-mindedly without even turning around, until he seemed to have unearthed something invisible this time. He twisted and fumbled frantically with his fingers before immediately regripping the hoe. With eyes ablaze like fire and white teeth clenched so hard they seemed about to shatter, he began digging beneath his feet with every shred of desperate strength. From behind him, Dr. Masaki entered calmly. His pince-nez glasses glinting, he watched Kure Ichirou's labor for a while. Then he approached close and tapped his right shoulder—raised mid-swing with the hoe.

Kure Ichirou, startled, lowered the hoe and turned dazedly toward Dr. Masaki while wiping away the flowing sweat. Seizing this opportunity, Dr. Masaki—with a speed too swift for the eye to catch—thrust one hand into Kure Ichirou’s breast pocket, snatched out a round object wrapped in a soiled handkerchief and the fish vertebra he had previously unearthed, then swiftly hid them behind his back. Yet Kure Ichirou appeared utterly oblivious, still wiping away the streaming sweat as he blinked his eyes and peered up from the hole. Gazing down at his face from the pit’s edge, Dr. Masaki smiled faintly.

“What have you just dug up?” Kure Ichirou, his face reddening with awkwardness, extended the index finger of his left hand toward the doctor’s nose. When the doctor brought his nose glasses closer for inspection, he saw a single strand of woman’s hair coiled tightly around the tip of that finger. Dr. Masaki, seeming to understand what this meant, nodded with a serious expression, but this time unwrapped the dirty handkerchief bundle he had been concealing behind his back, placed its contents in his left palm, and thrust them toward Kure Ichirou’s nose. In his palm—alongside the ramune marble picked up immediately upon entering this Liberation Therapy Field two months prior and today’s unearthed fish bone—there glinted a fragment of a red rubber comb and a broken glass tube about the size of a little finger.

“This is something you dug up from the soil, I suppose.” Kure Ichirou nodded while gasping for breath. While comparing Dr. Masaki’s face with the four items... “Hmm… Now, what is this? What purpose does this serve, I wonder…” “That is a blue langgan gem, a crystal tube, a human bone, and a coral comb.” Kure Ichirou answered casually without any particular thought, then promptly took the four pieces of junk and handkerchief from the doctor’s hand. He tied them into a rock-hard bundle and stuffed them deep into the innermost part of his robe as though they were precious treasures.

“Hmm...” “...Then why are you digging up the earth so desperately?” Kure Ichirou once again used the hoe he was about to thrust into the soil as a staff with his left hand and pointed beneath his feet with his right hand. “There’s a woman’s corpse buried here.” “Hmm...” “I see.” “Hmm...”

Dr. Masaki groaned. Keeping his nose glasses firmly in place, he stared so deeply into Kure Ichirou’s eyes it seemed to bore holes through them, then posed his questions in stern, clipped phrases—each word forcibly pressed into the listener’s ears. “Hmm… I see….” “However… as for when exactly that woman’s corpse was buried beneath the soil… when was that, I wonder…” Kure Ichirou, still gripping the hoe with both hands, looked up at the doctor’s face in surprise. The red color vanished from his cheeks in an instant, and his lips twitched restlessly.

“When… When… When… when was it…” he began repeating in a nightmare-like tone. For a brief while, he blankly surveyed the area until his expression shifted to an indescribably desolate, utterly lost countenance. The hoe clattered down as he released it. Weakly lowering his gaze, he slumped his shoulders and crawled out of the hole before plodding slowly toward the entrance. Dr. Masaki watched his retreating figure, crossed arms betraying a smile of deep satisfaction.

“It has come to pass, just as I foresaw.” “Psychological heredity manifests with not a single deviation!” “But I must steel myself for one final ordeal.” “Now comes the true spectacle…”

[Subtitle] Scene: Inside the Liberation Therapy Field on October 19 of the same year (approximately one month after the previous scene).

[Movie] Old man Gisaku wearing a headband appeared before the brick wall inside the now-flattened sandy field, tilling the soil exactly as shown in the initial projection. However, Gisaku had tilled one ridge’s worth more fields than when he first appeared in the earlier scene, while the thin girl beside him had planted dried branches and tile fragments up to half that amount. Kure Ichirou stood rigidly before them—just as in the initial scene—watching with a faint smile as the old man swung his hoe up and down, his hands clasped behind his back. Yet in the mere month that had passed, his complexion had turned deathly pale and his body grown plump—a transformation likely resulting from having ceased his hole-digging labors to remain sequestered in his room... the Seventh Room.

From behind him, Dr. Masaki approached with a smile and, after leisurely placing his hand on his shoulder, Kure Ichirou turned around with a start. “Well… It’s been a while since you came out, hasn’t it? You’ve turned completely pale… and on top of that, you’ve grown plump.” “…Yes…” And Kure Ichirou, still smiling as always, once again began watching the hoe’s rise and fall. “What are you doing there…” Dr. Masaki peered into his face as he asked. Kure Ichirou answered quietly, his eyes still fixed on the hoe.

“……I’m watching that person tilling the field.” “Hmm.” “Your mind has become much clearer, hasn’t it?” Dr. Masaki spoke as if muttering to himself while looking up and down at his profile, then gradually intensified his tone as he continued.

“That’s not it. You want to borrow that hoe, don’t you?”

Before these words had finished, Ichirou’s cheeks turned pale in an instant. He widened his eyes and looked at Dr. Masaki’s face, but soon turned back to the hoe and muttered as if to himself. “...Yes... That is my hoe.” “Yeah. I know that.” Dr. Masaki nodded. “...That hoe is yours. But since he’s working so earnestly like that, could you wait a little longer? Once the noon bell tolls twelve, that old man will surely toss aside that hoe and go eat… and once he does, he absolutely won’t come back out until sunset.”

“Are you sure?” Having said this, Kure Ichirou turned back to Dr. Masaki, his eyes glinting uneasily. Dr. Masaki nodded deeply in a manner that said “Be at ease.” “It’s certain… I’ll buy you a brand-new one soon enough.”

Kure Ichirou continued to uneasily stare at the hoe’s movements, but soon began muttering as if talking to himself. “I want it now…” “Hmm.” “Why… that…”

However, Kure Ichirou did not answer. He tightly closed his mouth and once again began watching the hoe's rise and fall. Dr. Masaki fixed his tense expression and stared intently at his profile. He seemed to be trying to extract something from that expression.

The large hawk’s shadow glided smoothly across the sandy ground before the two men.

———————————————————————

Well... Through what has been presented thus far, it appeared we had finally ascertained two matters: first, that the essence of Kure Ichirou's psychological heredity seemed connected to an ancient noblewoman adorned with lapis lazuli jewels, crystal tubes, and coral combs; second, that in his fervent efforts to complete a certain illustrated scroll modeled after this woman, Kure Ichirou had been zealously seeking out female corpses in this manner. However—why was it that when Dr. Masaki posed the question of when exactly the corpse had been buried underground, Kure Ichirou found himself dumbstruck, unable to respond, and simply returned to his room to brood...?

Why was it that he had now come to this liberation therapy field today—October 19, 1926 (Taisho 15), a full month later—and stood waiting intently for the old man’s hoe to become free…?

......Even now, from what direction and by what means was the crisis approaching this liberation therapy field for madmen......? The only ones who could clarify this doubt were Dr.Wakabayashi—who had investigated this incident—and myself, serving as his consultant... No—not Dr.Masaki on the screen... No—that wasn't it either... Ah—what a nuisance—I'll handle it myself... And while I'm at it—let's stop this moving picture too. And while I'm at it—let me return to being Dr.Masaki the Mad—writing this will alone late at night in Kyushu University's Psychiatry Department professor's office.

It may be a bit too flimsy, but this is just a will I’m writing to pass the time before I die anyway. I don't care how much the whiskey's gone to my head. After this, let come what may… Think I’ll have another smoke here. ……Ah, how delightful. On the eve of my suicide, I go on writing this will, mocking the entire universe. When tired of writing, he would sit down in his swivel chair still wearing his slippers, hug his knees, and puff out ultramarine and gamboge-colored smoke. ……Then the smoke, like morning or evening clouds drifting lazily, would sway gently upward in swirling spirals toward the ceiling. Upon reaching a certain height, it would scatter slowly and languidly like oil floating on water, twisting and untwisting like sentient beings—now sorrowful, now joyous—as it traced myriad non-geometric curves into the air, gradually thinning until it vanished. The sight of me—a small, skeleton-like figure vacantly gazing up at it from within the large swivel chair—must have looked exactly like a sorcerer straight out of Arabian Nights…… Ah, I’m sleepy. The whiskey must be taking effect. Mumble mumble mumble... The window is filled with stars. ...Hmm... What was it again... Mmm... A single star... "Find one star, and the doctor ends his worldly existence"... Hah... Not exactly a grateful sentiment... Mumble mumble mumble mumble.................. Mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble.................................................................................... Mumble mumble　mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble mumble　........................................................................................................................................................................................................

×                             ×                             ×

“Well… Have you finished reading it?” A voice suddenly arose at my ear—and before I could grasp it—echoed through the room with an “Aaah…” before vanishing. In that instant, I thought it might be Dr. Wakabayashi’s voice, but immediately recognized its entirely different tone—resonant and carrying a youthful timbre—so startling me that I spun around to look behind. Yet the room lay utterly vacant from corner to corner, not a single mouse visible. ……How strange…….

The bright autumn morning light streamed in like a flood from the three-sided windows, dazzlingly reflecting off the glass of the specimen cabinets lined in several rows, the varnished paint, and the linoleum floor as it fell completely still.

...Chirp chirp chirp chirp chirp... Trill trill trill trill trill trill... Chirp chirp... The sound of a flock of small birds passing through the pines was all that could be heard……. ...That’s strange..., I thought as I snapped the will shut and absently gazed before me... I jolted upright in my seat. Before my very nose sat a strange human being... On the swivel chair beyond the large desk where I had been certain Dr.Wakabayashi was seated all along, Dr.Wakabayashi's form had vanished without a trace, and in his place perched a small skeleton-like man in a white examination gown, sitting stiffly face-to-face with me.

He had a closely shaven head… eyebrows smoothly shaven off… his entire sunburned complexion reddish-black, appearing fiftyish yet somehow younger… large rimless pince-nez perched on his high nose… a freshly lit cigar clenched tightly between lips curved into a large へ-shaped frown… arms crossed high over his chest as he leaned back… a skeleton-like little man… When our eyes met, he leisurely took the cigar in his right hand, bared a row of gleaming white teeth, and let out a booming laugh.

I leapt up. "Whoa... Dr. Masaki..." "Ahahahaha... Were you surprised... Hahahahaha." "No no, most impressive!" "That you remembered my name correctly is most impressive." "Not only that, but the fact that you didn't mistake me for a ghost and run away is all the more commendable." "Ha ha ha ha ha!" "Ha ha ha ha ha!"

As I became engulfed in the reverberations of that laughter, I felt my entire body gradually going numb. The will I had been gripping in my right hand clattered onto the large desk... and at the same moment, with Dr. Masaki—the very man who had written it—appearing before me, it felt as though every event since this morning had been utterly negated. All strength suddenly drained from my body, and once again I thudded back into the swivel chair, landing hard on my rear. Over and over I swallowed my saliva...

When he saw my reaction, Dr. Masaki leaned back in his chair and laughed uproariously, looking thoroughly amused. “Ha ha ha ha ha!” “You’re utterly flabbergasted, aren’t you?” “Ahahahahaha.” “There’s no need to be so flabbergasted.” “You’re now caught in a preposterous delusion.”

“...Preposterous... delusion...” “...Still don’t get it, do you?” “Fuh-fuh-fuh.” “Then try thinking about it.” “You were led here to this room by Wakabayashi earlier… I think it was before eight… and have been told all sorts of things since then.” “It’s been about a month since I died or something like that… Mmm, mmm… how the date on that calendar works or whatever… Hahahaha! Were you surprised? I know everything, you see… I…” “Then, while you were made to read through that ‘Madman’s Hell Heretic Ballad,’ ‘Fetal Dreams,’ newspaper clippings, and the will, I must have truly come to be believed dead for a full month since long ago… Isn’t that right?”

“……………”

“Ahahahahaha.” “But that thing—for all its trouble—is Wakabayashi’s trick.” “You’ve fallen right into Wakabayashi’s trap without a hitch.” “Just look at the proof.” “If you check the very end of that will, you’ll understand.” “That part should be open now… Well? The proof that I wrote all through last night… You can still smell the fresh ink’s stench, can’t you?” “Hahahahaha.” “How’s that for you?” “A will must appear after its writer dies—but that’s no ironclad rule.” “There’s nothing strange about me still breathing, is there?” “Ha ha ha ha ha!”

“……………”

My jaw hung open. I was perplexed, wondering why Dr. Masaki and Dr. Wakabayashi would play such a bizarre prank. Even as pranks, they were all too strange and irrational... Were all these events I'd witnessed since this morning and the contents of those various documents truly serious facts, I wondered. Or perhaps this was nothing more than a play orchestrated by the two doctors in collusion to mock me... As I turned these thoughts over in my mind, the entire mountain of emotions that had filled my head until this very moment—the astonishment, the shock, the burning curiosity—all began swaying and crumbling at once. I felt them fading away somewhere along with my own body.

Enduring it steadfastly, I planted both hands firmly on the edge of the large desk and gazed vaguely at Dr. Masaki’s face grinning before my nose as if in a dream.

“Hmph... hmph hmph hmph,”

Dr. Masaki snickered. In that instant, he choked on the cigar smoke he’d been about to swallow, his face contorting into a jumble of agony and amusement as he frantically clamped down on his pince-nez.

“Ahahahaha... *cough cough*... What’s with that ridiculous face... Hmph hmph hmph... Are you saying it’s inconvenient that I’m not dead... *cough hack*... Is that it?” “*Cough hack*... This is quite a predicament, I must say... This is how it is.”

“Listen here.” “You were lying spread-eagle in the middle of Room Seven early this morning… I think it was around 1 a.m.” “And when you woke up, you must have been shocked to suddenly find yourself having forgotten your own name and made a great fuss all by yourself.” “Wh-what... How do you know that...?” “You know perfectly well—you were the one making all that noise shouting at the top of your lungs.” “The others were all asleep, but when I—who’d been writing this will in this room—heard the commotion and went to check, there you were in Room Seven, desperately searching for your own name… ‘Ah, so he’s finally beginning to awaken from his somnambulistic state,’ I thought, hurrying back upstairs to finish drafting the will. Then, after dawn broke and I finally awoke from my nap—still feeling a bit dazed—it wasn’t long before Wakabayashi came rushing over in that new siren-equipped car of his.” …This is darkly amusing. “It appears someone quickly noticed that you were beginning to awaken from your somnambulistic state and reported it to Wakabayashi.” “Quite efficient of them, but I wondered what they intended to do upon rushing over... Continuing to observe from the shadows, I saw Wakabayashi give you a haircut, bathe you, and dress you up as a proper university student before introducing you to a beautiful girl hospitalized in Room Six next to yours... And then, claiming she was your fiancée, he must have completely flabbergasted you.”

“Wh-what... Then that girl is a mental patient after all...” “That’s right.” “And her mental disorder is rare enough to be considered an academic curiosity!” “On the eve of her all-important wedding night, after being shown an utterly preposterous somnambulistic episode of so-called ‘abnormal sexual psychological heredity’ by her key groom, she unknowingly fell under the suggestive influence of that episode, developed a psychological hereditary attack matching the groom’s lineage, and temporarily lapsed into a cataleptic state.” “But then, through Wakabayashi’s uncanny skill, she revived—only to start longing for Emperor Xuanzong and Yang Guifei, who died over a thousand years ago; apologizing to an older sister who doesn’t exist; or cradling an imaginary baby while declaring, ‘You must become Japanese!’… Though by now, she’s regained most of her sanity.”

“Th... then... th... that girl’s... name... what is it...?” “What?” “You should know... without even asking.” “The renowned beauty of Meinohama, Komachi… Kure Moyoko…” “Wh... th... then... am I Kure Ichirou...” As I started to say this, Dr. Masaki snapped his large downturned mouth tightly shut. With his face contorted from cigar smoke, he fixed the focus of his black eyes squarely on my face.

I felt all the blood in my body rapidly concentrating toward my heart as if vanishing away. Cold sweat plopped down from my forehead, my lips began quivering, and I thought I might sway again. My body—standing with both hands braced against the large desk—seemed to scatter and thin into the air alongside it, leaving only my eyeballs behind to stare unwaveringly at Dr. Masaki... Within this sensation, my soul raced through infinite time and space at lethal velocity... Trembling with dread that I might recall my past as Kure Ichirou... Straining to hear the sound of my own lungs and heart assaulting me like great waves from some unknowable distance... Quivering and trembling uncontrollably.

However...no matter how frantically my heart and lungs clamored and struggled, my soul simply could not summon forth any memories of the past as Kure Ichirou. No matter how many times I repeated "Kure Ichirou" in my head during that time—countless times, perhaps—not a shred of nostalgia or familiarity arose toward that name as being my own. No matter how much I racked my brain over my past memories, they would only trace back to that droning sound I’d heard in the predawn hours this morning before hitting an absolute dead end. No matter what others might think...no matter what evidence I might be shown...I could not recognize myself as Kure Ichirou.

……I let out a deep sigh. Along with that, the awareness of my entire body gradually returned around me. The pulsations of my heart and lungs began to calm. As I plopped down onto the chair, cold sweat trickled from both armpits. Then, at that very moment, right before my nose, Dr. Masaki—who had been wearing an utterly composed expression—puffed out a mouthful of purple smoke. “Well? Did you remember your past?”

I silently shook my head from side to side. As I pulled a new handkerchief from my pocket and wiped the sweat from my face, I began to feel somewhat calmer. Yet even so, the sheer number of incomprehensible matters seemed overwhelming—growing too terrified to even move—and I hunched deeper into the chair. Then... moments later, Dr. Masaki gave a loud cough that startled me so violently I nearly leaped up.

“Ahem… If you haven’t remembered, I’ll tell you once more. Listen well… Calm yourself and pay close attention.” “You are currently caught in one trick.” “In other words… my colleague Dr. Wakabayashi Kyōtarō aims to make you recognize yourself as Kure Ichirou—to fully convince you beyond doubt—before arranging your meeting with me.” “And through that, he intends to have you denounce me as a one-of-a-kind, utterly wicked and inhuman monster in this world.”

“What?!”

“You…”

“Yeah. “Now listen. “If you just calm down and clearly think through everything that has happened since this morning in your mind, everything will resolve itself without any difficulty. “…Alright?”

Dr. Masaki coughed once in a composed tone, as though solemnly returning to seriousness. Leaning back in his chair and blowing thick plumes of smoke one after another, he calmly turned his attention to the calendar hanging beside the large fireplace. “Alright?” “Let me state this clearly again—today is October 20th of the fifteenth year of Taisho.” “Alright?” “Let me state this once again.” “Today is October 20th of the fifteenth year of Taisho… As written in this will, it’s the day after October 19th—when Kure Ichirou suddenly reappeared at this liberation therapy field after a month’s absence to watch Old Man Hachimaki Gisaku plow the fields. …As proof, take a look at that calendar.” “……OCTOBER……19……that is, it shows yesterday’s date.” “This is because I was too busy since yesterday to remember tearing off that page, and at the same time proves that I’ve been staying here all night since yesterday… Alright?” “Understood?” “……And then, while you’re at it, look at the electric clock above my head.” “It’s ten thirteen now.” “Yeah.” “It matches mine exactly.” “In other words, it stands to reason that only five hours have passed since I began drafting this will early this morning and then started dozing off… If you synthesize this fact with the one about the ink at the end of the will still being vividly fresh, there should be nothing strange about me being perfectly fine like this.” “Alright? …If you don’t first firmly keep this point in mind, there’s a risk you might later fall into a serious delusion.”

"But... Dr. Wakabayashi just now..." "No good..." As he declared with an even louder voice, Dr. Masaki's right fist rose high, then danced through the air as if to violently shatter the confusion in my mind... vibrant... brimming with an energy that seemed to negate all else... "No good. Believe what I say! You must not take Wakabayashi's words as truth! Wakabayashi has made one critical mistake on this very point from the outset. That bastard must have detected the burnt stench of the manuscript drafts I incinerated in this fireplace when he entered earlier. Then upon finding this will on the desk, he immediately concocted a trick and fed you that explanation."

"But... however... today is November 20th—one month after you passed away..."

“Tch… You’re impossible. “I can’t handle you clinging so stubbornly to your preconceived notions… Listen.” “Listen well… This is how it is.” As he spoke in this carefully explanatory manner, Dr. Masaki—with evident irritation—spat out the bits of cigar that had stuck to his tongue onto the floor. Then, leaning over the desk and propping himself up on both elbows, he thrust his tobacco-stained yellowed right finger before my dazed nose and explained each phrase as if forcing them one by one into my head.

“Now then.” “Listen well.” “Now, don’t get this wrong… The preposterous fabrication Wakabayashi spun about today being the one-month anniversary of my death is nothing more than a petty trick to keep you from panicking.” “Now then… If you were to realize that only a few hours have passed since I disappeared after writing this will in such a state, you would surely panic, thinking I had gone off to commit suicide.” “And if that actually happened, even that bastard wouldn’t be able to just sit still.” “Whether out of duty as a friend or responsibility as dean, Wakabayashi would have no choice but to abandon everything and track down my whereabouts to prevent my suicide… But then again, in doing so, he might lose the one and only opportunity to use his own hands to revive your past memories… Don’t you think?… That’s right… For Wakabayashi personally, whether you recall your past memories or not amounts to a lifelong critical matter.” “And since this morning has presented itself as the perfect opportunity…”

“……………” “...That’s why Wakabayashi—though he knew full well I’m listening in from somewhere—spouted that half-baked lie about today being November 20th, a month after this will was written. A forensic pathologist should know better than to spout such clumsy nonsense! All just to calm you down at any cost.” “By slowly carrying out this experiment and restoring your memories as Kure Ichirou, he figured that everything would already be within his grasp.” “…If you were to recover your past memories as Kure Ichirou just as Wakabayashi anticipates, then making you recognize someone like me as your sworn enemy who killed both your parent and wife would be a trivial matter—all it takes is the right explanation.” “…And in fact, I—thankfully being a mental scientist—am confident that I could at any time hypnotize someone like Kure Ichirou, who knows nothing, and make him strangle his parent or wife to prepare such experimental materials.” “He’s the perfect candidate to be the suspect in this case. Right?” “That’s right.”

“……………” “And then, if—by some remote chance—that experiment were to fail… In other words, even after making you read those documents and you still recalled nothing yourself, he would employ a last resort… Stealthily concealing himself so you wouldn’t notice this time, he would confront you with me—who would undoubtedly emerge here afterward—to test whether seeing my face would jog your memory… And if by some chance that test succeeded, it would ultimately mean devising an exquisitely ruthless scheme to use my own power to make me bow down in defeat.” "That sharp instinct for timing is truly that bastard’s signature specialty." “Listen.”

“……………” “That bastard has always had a uniquely formidable talent for such schemes.” “No matter how innocent a suspect may be, once they fall into that bastard’s clutches and get interrogated, their head becomes all muddled, plunging them into a psychological state where they can’t think straight.” “In the end, they first become utterly confused about what’s what, then resign themselves to the inescapable reality—and on the other hand, those who panic end up being so impressed by how absolutely justified it all seems that they even take responsibility for crimes they know nothing about.” “Those elaborate third-rate interrogation methods they’ve been using in America lately are nothing but child’s play.” “That bastard employs every conceivable trick from first-rate to hundredth-rate—using all possible fronts and flanks—so it’s unbearable.” “Even now, that’s exactly what’s happening.” “Suppose I, just as that bastard anticipated, killed Dr. Saito, succeeded him, attempted such experiments, failed, and became a man resolved to commit suicide?” “The conversation would proceed logically before me—listening in from somewhere—so that I would gradually come to be recognized as such a great villain… and so that you yourself would come to be recognized as none other than Kure Ichirou, my sworn enemy.” “At the same time, were I to fall into a state where I must helplessly watch and listen as the achievements of my life's work are smoothly stolen away—unable to lift a finger—then consider whether any greater torture than this could exist for me.” “Don’t you think I’d have no choice but to either stay silent and kill myself or come out and confess? …That bastard Wakabayashi’s methods are precisely this kind of unbearable approach.” “No matter how difficult the case, once it falls into that bastard’s hands, he’ll surely twist out a culprit from somewhere.” “That’s why behind the fact that bastard gets praised in the newspapers as the ‘Labyrinth Breaker’ or whatnot, such circumstances are lurking.”

“……………” “But here’s the thing.” “But it seems that this time—of all times—things aren’t going according to plan.” “From this morning onward, that bastard’s continuous experiments have all missed their mark without eliciting any reaction from you whatsoever—and seeing how even his prized interrogation tricks are being exposed right from the top in this manner—there appears little cause for such terror.” “Even our peerless forensic scholar seems rather flustered since daybreak—perhaps overstrained from facing me as his opponent.” “Or perhaps this constitutes what one might call the gentleman’s ‘unprecedented and unrepeatable failure.’ Ha ha…”

"But... but... but..." “Still clinging to your ‘buts’… What is it… What’s this ‘but’ about…” "But... you should be conducting that experiment..." “Exactly. “Of course, it’s only natural that I conduct the experiment to make you recall your past.” “That’s why that bastard used such tricks to monopolize the results of this experiment… He tried his damnedest to leave me for dead.”

“Wh-wha... Th-that’s... Such an absurd thing...” "It’s being properly carried out, so it must be amusing." “First and foremost, isn’t the fact that I’ve avoided falling for his tricks, survived like this, and come here to chatter away the best proof of all?” Having finished saying this, Dr. Masaki formed a cold sneer—how utterly detestable and piercingly sarcastic. He leaned back arrogantly in the swivel chair and crossed his arms. He sneered while blowing cigar smoke high into the air. As though he had precisely anticipated Dr. Wakabayashi listening intently from somewhere…

When I saw that, my heart was struck anew by terror, shrinking up without resistance. ...What a horrifying battle between these two doctors. What a profoundly tenacious battle of wits. Until this very moment, I had never dreamed that I myself was caught in the midst of such a dreadful conflict... Only now did I realize that all the anguish, desperation, terror, and madness I had witnessed until this moment had been dragged about by these two doctors' demonic exchange of tricks... Now filled with an impulse to scream and flee... I half-rose from my seat as if about to stand. ...But...

But at this moment, for some reason, I could not move even an inch away from the chair. Wiping the sweat beading on my forehead with a handkerchief, I settled back into my seat once more and let out a sigh. And so, while staring fixedly at Dr. Masaki’s face, I fell into a psychological state where I had to wait with a life-or-death intensity for those darkened, unsettling lips to begin moving. ……Perhaps it was because my soul had already been utterly absorbed by the grotesque allure of this psychiatric experiment itself—an experiment over which these two doctors were battling not just with all their might, but rather with their very lives…… Or perhaps it was because the indescribable, unfathomable truth flowing beneath that account had seized my heart with a vise-like grip, making the blood of inexplicable curiosity surge within me…… Lost in such thoughts—wondering why—I stared vacantly into the space before me when Dr. Masaki’s voice, punctuated by another cough, resounded freshly and vividly by my ear.

“Hahahahaha… Well? Have you figured it out yet—the cause of your delusion… Hmm? You’ve got it… But there are still a few points you don’t quite grasp yet. Hmm… You’re rather sharp, aren’t you? …First and foremost, you yourself sitting there have absolutely no understanding of what youth from where—under what karmic causality—came to be entangled in this incident… That much should be clear to you. Ha ha ha… But rest assured. If you listen to what I’m about to tell you, all your doubts will fall away as if combed through with a fine-toothed comb. This account may involve some repetition, but it continues from my will—starting with Wakabayashi’s and my past secrets regarding this experiment, gradually delving deeper into the substance of Kure Ichirou’s psychological heredity, until at last you yourself will finally come to understand what you truly are. Of course, if you happen to realize your own circumstances along the way, there’s nothing to be done about it. The story would conclude right there—happily ever after—but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. For now, just listen and enjoy what comes before… But let me stress this once more—you absolutely mustn’t go having any more delusions from this point onward. I’d be in quite a bind if you start getting such absurd ideas—that I’m a ghost or that it’s been a month since I died. Ha ha ha, alright? If you listen to what comes next and fall into such delusions or illusions, there may be no way to recover from it forever. Are you sure… really sure you’re alright? …Hmm, there there. Then I’ll proceed with the story reassured…”

As he spoke, Dr. Masaki relit his dying cigar. Then he thrust both hands into his pockets and began puffing away at the cigar with apparent relish, but soon adjusted it between his lips once more and hefted himself back into his seat amidst the billowing smoke.

"...Now then. "...Now then—this matter will eventually be exposed to society, so you'll understand when you see it in the papers... No. "It may have already appeared in yesterday's evening edition or this morning's papers... but in fact, a major incident erupted yesterday at that lunatic liberation therapy field. "In short—to conclude my psychological heredity experiment centered on this incident—the fuse of the applied mental science bomb I'd planted among that crowd of madmen in the liberation therapy field had been smoldering steadily since then, until yesterday at noon—that is, almost simultaneous with the firing of the noon cannon on October 19, 1926—it exploded splendidly... Nngh. "To put it plainly, there's nothing to it. "That fuse was nothing more than a device set upon a single hoe. But being a fuse applied with mental science—producing no smoke or visible flame—ordinary eyes could never perceive such a contrivance. "It had appeared to be nothing more than an ordinary hoe. "...Moreover, to be honest, the results could be said to have exploded beyond expectations—it turned into such an unexpected tragedy that even I was momentarily taken aback. As the one responsible, I immediately went to the director's office to tender my resignation... But upon further reflection... it seems this is about the time to wrap up my experiments. "Since Wakabayashi will handle all publications of my research up to this point... truth be told, until then I hadn't thought him such a black-hearted bastard... He'll manage things somehow. "Since it's such a hassle, I decided to resign from my human duties too... So I went back to my lodging once, tidied things up, then had a drink in the lively part of Higashi Nakasu until I was feeling thoroughly refreshed—and when I returned here to organize the documents... Well, color me surprised. "Just moments ago, when I left here, that Room Six—which had been vacant until then—now had its electric light blazing brightly. "Thinking it strange, I asked the janitor who was about to leave about the situation, and he said Dr. Wakabayashi had brought a young lady from somewhere, requested the duty medical officer, and had just now had her admitted. "Moreover, they say that young lady possesses a beauty and grace unlike anything ever seen—utterly indescribable."

Even I couldn't help but involuntarily strike my knee in admiration at that moment. This has turned into a shrewd affair. Judging by this state of affairs, that bastard Wakabayashi Kyōtarō isn't someone who can be handled with one or even two ropes. He is a scoundrel equivalent to his value as a forensic scientist—no, perhaps even greater than that. First, while he plays the meek cat before me, I realized through writing that he's a psychiatrist who could nearly rival me if I let my guard down—and what's more, he's remarkably adept at exploiting emotional vulnerabilities. This is because... As I had written in this will, the purpose behind that bastard Wakabayashi Kyōtarō exploiting the university president's authority at the time of this incident's outbreak to turn his young woman into a living corpse and bring her under his control was something I could never comprehend from then until today—but now that I see it, it's nothing more than this. That bastard, anticipating the moment when you had regained some degree of your true nature, secretly arranged for you to meet that girl and sought to forcibly make you recognize yourself as Kure Ichirou through three avenues: allure, desire, and logical coercion. And as I mentioned earlier, he seeks to make you believe I am your mortal enemy and have you formally declare that fact...to expose to society the truth of this incident twisted to his will...Moreover, it has become as clear as if held in my hand—this path he's scheming to present your declaration as the inaugural case study in his life's work, *Psychoscientific Crime and Its Evidentiary Traces*.

……So I too considered. ……Very well. If that's your plan, then I have my own. After all, Wakabayashi’s research on psychoscientific crime is constructed upon my original principles of psychological heredity, so turning the tables on him would be simplicity itself. By resolutely burning all my mental science research manuscripts here and leaving behind this half-baked will outlining their contents, that bastard Wakabayashi would have no choice but to incorporate this testament into his writings—else the entire foundation of his research publication would crumble. But whether he could actually publish my will... what manner of sleight-of-hand he might employ to do so... now that would make for a fascinating spectacle... Depending on circumstances, this will of mine might well become the most vicious parting gift ever bestowed...

When I thought about it this way... I suddenly felt elated. I hurried to this room, burned all the documents, and began writing this will—but when dawn broke and you showed signs of awakening, Wakabayashi, who had been eagerly waiting and preparing all along, rushed over without delay and promptly introduced you to his beautiful young lady. But... he had splendidly failed. Admittedly, the other party had acknowledged you as their dearly beloved older brother, so it was half a success in that regard—but you yourself, the central figure, gave that beautiful girl the cold shoulder... Since you refused to recognize her as either your cousin or fiancée, it appears they've now changed tactics to bring you to this room.

Now then, to tell the truth, even I was somewhat flustered at this moment. The truly fearsome one was that bastard, Dr. Wakabayashi Kyōtarō. That bastard had already seen through these thoughts of mine. He had long since discerned that I would sooner or later wrap up this perilously reckless liberation therapy experiment, announce its contents to the academic world, and vanish without a trace. Moreover, he had thoroughly discerned that I would exploit even this Meinohama bride-killing incident as experimental material for myself alone, reporting it to academia in such a way that no one afterward would recognize it as a criminal case. Therefore, that bastard mobilized all his resources and proceeded with lightning speed. And so he schemed to pin me down and take me out before I could vanish completely.

That bastard must have discerned I’d been holed up here since last night the moment he entered the main building entrance this morning. Realizing he’d brought you here to corner me with some scheme… Ah, so that’s his game—that old Kuwana trick. Thinking to give him a good scare, I left the will and half-burned documents lying there as they were and vanished along with the whiskey bottle. It wasn’t through jumping out the window or slipping through the far door. I disappeared without taking a single step from this room, unnoticed by anyone… To put it that way makes it sound like another applied mental science illusion, but that wasn’t it. The trick lay in this large furnace.

This large furnace was designed from the outset to burn all such manuscripts within it should this experiment fail or should others attempt to steal the contents of my research. In fact, I myself designed this large furnace from the outset as a gas-and-electricity hybrid with automatic ignition—intending that should circumstances require, I might vanish with a whoosh while baffling the world with smoke... Observe... When you remove this iron lid, you'll find the interior remarkably spacious, with gas jets positioned between electric heating elements across the entire base. It’s nothing more than about two hundred large Bunsen lamps arranged in parallel. If you place a living thing on top of this, open the gas valve while turning on the electric switch, the gas will immediately gush out and suffocate it. Once the electric heater heats up and ignites the gas with a bang, within an hour even the bones will crumble to pieces. If you pile stones or tiles on top, they’ll all become incandescent and emit intense radiant heat, you see. Look here—nearly four bookcases packed with manuscripts on Western paper that’s harder to burn than flesh—how about that? They must have turned into just this much white ash by now. If I were to turn to smoke again now, all my hard-won university principles would simply be reduced back to the air from whence they came. Ha ha ha!... The moment I heard you and Wakabayashi coming up those stairs, I slipped inside here with the whiskey bottle, spread newspaper over these ashes, sat cross-legged in perfect comfort—resolved to turn to smoke at any moment—all while puffing on a cigar and listening intently.

But as expected of that bastard. He was a renowned forensic scientist of the age. Not only had he remained utterly unperturbed despite my vanished form, but he immediately seized that opportunity to begin plunging you into delusion. ...That bastard's brain worked on multiple levels like Prince Shōtoku himself. So while telling you about myself and Dr. Saito, I had quickly examined this will's contents—though somewhat inconvenient in parts, its lack of conclusions made it safe for now. Moreover, realizing how making you read this could more effectively convince you of being Kure Ichirou than any direct explanation, I'd deliberately thrust it upon you before slipping away unnoticed during your engrossment. And now he appeared to be testing what countermeasures I might take.

……So I found it increasingly intriguing, I must say. ……Very well… If that’s how it is, I thought I’d turn the tables on his scheme and counterattack his challenge in reverse. So I quietly emerged from the furnace, settled into this chair, and waited for you to finish reading that will… “Ha ha... How about that? “Right now, you and I are confronting each other under the plan of the renowned forensic scientist Dr. Wakabayashi Kyōtarō. “And so—what youth you are, from where and bearing what name… by what causal ties you are bound to this incident and made to sit in that chair now—these matters remain undetermined, both academically and practically.”

……So if that bastard Wakabayashi’s prediction comes true—if you awaken from your dissociative amnesia as Kure Ichirou of Meinohama and identify me as the shadowy orchestrator behind this incident… a heartless, diabolical mental science trickster… then this confrontation will end in my defeat. “But conversely, if you utterly fail to recall your past memories as Kure Ichirou, then simply put—I win… The fact will become public that you’re suffering from a self-awareness disorder called ‘dissociative amnesia,’ a nameless youth dragged into this incident by Wakabayashi’s machinations from a third-party standpoint after being institutionalized in Kyushu University’s psychiatric ward—and with that, Wakabayashi’s plan goes up in smoke. You’re standing on that razor’s edge of the ring, you see…” “How utterly fascinating this is, don’t you think?” “A thrilling yet profound contest of wits between an unparalleled master of forensic medicine and an unprecedented mental scientist.” “Moreover, whether Kure Ichirou—the one who should decide this contest—is you yourself or not remains undetermined, as I just mentioned.” “Hakkeyoi-ya! We’re at the ‘left, left’ stage now.” “Ha ha ha! …”

Dr. Masaki's shrill laughter reverberated cacophonously off every object in the room before crashing into my ears. Then it tore through my fogged mind—still suspended between trusting either doctor's claims—before vanishing with an eerie hiss. Yet Dr. Masaki remained oblivious to my turmoil, firmly squeezing one eye shut again as he luxuriously drew cigar smoke into his lungs. He then planted both palms on the swivel chair's armrests and began laboriously heaving himself upright.

“Hup! ...And now we must finally commence the decisive match.” “First and foremost, I must restore your past memories with my own hands and have you confirm your identity yourself—otherwise, it’d be underhanded of me in front of Wakabayashi. …Come over here for now.” “This time, I myself will attempt the first experiment to make you recall your past, so…”

In a state halfway to sleepwalking, I floated unsteadily up from my chair. Guided by Dr. Masaki through an eerie sensation of Dr. Wakabayashi's pale eyes watching from somewhere unseen, I approached the southern window... but... when I glimpsed outside past the shoulder of Dr. Masaki's white lab coat, I gasped and froze. Spread beneath my eyes lay the full panorama of the Liberation Therapy Field for the Insane. ......And there, in one corner, stood none other than Kure Ichirou. ...watching over an old man's field work with his back turned toward us... wild disheveled hair... pallid complexion... flushed cheeks... the figure of a youth sloppily wrapped in a black kimono...

The instant I saw that ghastly figure so vividly before me in reality, I involuntarily closed my eyes. Then I tightly covered my face with both hands over them. I was struck by a shock unbearable to behold... fear... and an indescribable nervous tension... ...Kure Ichirou is right there, isn't he? That must be the figure of Kure Ichirou described in his will, isn't it? If that is indeed Kure Ichirou... then what in the world am I, standing here...?

...The instant I looked out the window just now, it felt as though I myself had slipped out from myself—transformed into that figure standing over there—while only the soul left behind watched... A ghastly, desolate sensation...

Could it be that what I had just seen was not a hallucination? Could it have been a waking dream…? As these thoughts flashed through my mind like lightning... while gripped by an indescribably suffocating, inexplicable excitement... I slowly opened my eyes once more.

However, no matter how I reexamined the scene within the Liberation Therapy Field, I could not perceive it as a dream. ...A blue, blue sky... A red brick wall... White, dazzling sand... Black figures roaming over it... At that moment, Dr. Masaki, who had been standing before me deep in thought about something, abruptly turned around and casually pointed out the window. “...How about it...do you know where here is...”

However, I could not respond. I could only manage a slight nod. So profoundly had I become captivated from the very moment I opened my eyes by the indescribably bizarre spectacle within the grounds. Across the expanse of white sand within the grounds, gleaming under the azure sky, the black shadows of patients wandering restlessly were nearly all repeating exactly as before the tasks depicted in the will mentioned earlier. As though each of their movements were a staged demonstration proving Dr. Masaki's principles of psychological heredity in practice... Old Man Gisaku continued wielding his hoe, now carving out a new ridge of sand... while Young Kure Ichirou, still with his back turned this way, stood rigidly before the old man, intently watching the motion of the hoe's blade. ...The middle-aged woman strutted about, oblivious to having dropped her cardboard crown...the bearded giant who had been worshiping it now lay with his forehead buried in the sand, exhausted from prostration...the diminutive orator pressed his fist against the brick wall in prayer...and the gaunt, bluish girl peered about the grounds as if searching for something to plant in the old man's new furrows. As for the rest of them, they only appeared positioned differently—the significance of their tasks was no different whatsoever from what had been described in the will I read earlier. However... The long-haired female student who should have been singing and dancing around like someone dance-crazed was now digging a hole in the sand deep enough to bury her arms up to the shoulders directly beneath our window—using a cardboard crown and withered pine branch to construct a small trap—which alone seemed slightly divergent from expectations. Yet no matter how I considered it, I couldn't help finding it utterly perplexing that there was not a single trace visible of yesterday noon's great catastrophe that Dr. Masaki had just described—no indication of when, where, or which lunatic had caused it. Whether because the dance-crazed girl had stopped singing or due to our viewing through glass panes, everything had fallen as silent as shadows. The eerie unease... When I tentatively counted them, there were exactly ten people as written in the will—neither increased nor decreased—which left me utterly perplexed.

And yet, even more strangely, as I gazed down at this utterly unchanged, quietly distinct scene, the psycho-scientific explosion that Dr. Masaki had orchestrated using the psychological heredity of these ten lunatics—the catastrophic event that had caused his resignation—was now imminently about to begin... It was neither yesterday’s affair nor the day before’s. I couldn’t help but feel a premonition that this was the fact now beginning to unfold before my very eyes… No… It was not only the patients within the grounds. The two large red brick chimneys standing side by side on the distant roof, supporting the indigo expanse of sky... The thick black swirls of soot just beginning to billow forth from their tops... Even the perfectly round, glaring sun shining above them all—it felt as though these were being governed by some mysterious principle of mental science, each moment drawing closer to that unprecedented catastrophe. A bottomlessly cold, solemn sensation kept assaulting the nape of my neck until I could no longer suppress the shivers wracking my entire body. The more I thought about how absurd it all was… the more I became convinced of it until I could no longer help myself. I frantically tried to suppress these mysterious... suffocating emotions while still fixing my eyes on the scene within the Liberation Therapy Field. I stared at Kure Ichirou’s back as he watched the old man’s field work, with an abnormal pounding in my chest…

That was the moment. Suddenly, a low, whispering voice sounded near my ear… “What are you looking at……you……”

The tone of that voice was utterly different from Dr. Masaki’s previous ones, so I startled and turned around again. When I looked, Dr. Masaki had come right beside me without my noticing, standing rigidly with a cigar emitting a thin wisp of smoke in his hand. Every trace of his earlier smile had vanished from his face, and beneath his pince-nez, he was glaring at my profile with jet-black eyes as if to bore holes through me.

......I let out a deep sigh. And then, steadying myself as best I could, I replied.

“I’m looking at the Liberation Therapy Field.” “Hmm…”

Dr. Masaki, who had growled deep in his gut, continued staring into my eyes without so much as a blink. “Hmm… And do you see anything… within the Liberation Therapy Field…” I quietly looked back into his eyes, finding Dr. Masaki’s manner of questioning somehow peculiar.

"Yes... There seem to be ten madmen here." "What... Ten madmen..."

Dr. Masaki, who had cut in with a flustered voice, appeared profoundly astonished by something and glared at me intensely once more.

While feeling that gaze against my cheek, I turned back once more to look inside the Liberation Therapy Field and began staring intently at Kure Ichirou's back. ...Any moment now he'll turn this way—I feel our eyes will meet—and if that happens... something terrible will happen—My whole body grows rigid instinctively...

“Hmm…” Dr. Masaki let out a disconcertingly clear grunt beside me. “Can you see the madmen playing inside there as clear as day…” I nodded silently. Though I thought his questioning was growing increasingly strange, I paid it no particular mind… “Hmm…” “And you still say there are ten people there?”

I nodded once more and turned back. “Yes. There are exactly ten people here.”

“Hmm——”

Dr. Masaki groaned. Hollowing his jet-black eyeballs deep into their sockets...

“Hmm. This is strange... This is an extremely intriguing phenomenon...”

Muttering as if to himself, he slowly averted his gaze from my face and looked out the window. His complexion grew slightly pale as he appeared deep in thought. Before long, his face regained its former vigor, and he turned back to me with a grin that revealed his white teeth. Pointing through the window, he inquired in a hearty tone.

“Then I have one more question—there’s a young man standing in that corner of the field watching the old man’s hoe movements, correct?”

“Yes. He is here.”

“Hmm… He’s there… Now, which direction is that young man standing facing?” As Dr. Masaki’s questions grew increasingly peculiar, I answered while feeling an odd sensation. “He’s standing rigidly with his back turned this way.” “So I can’t see his face.” “Hmm… I thought as much.” “……But keep watching.” “...for he may turn this way any moment now…” “At that moment, what sort of face that young man will be making... you shall...”

When Dr. Masaki said this, my entire body stiffened with a start for some unknown reason. It felt as though both my heartbeat and breathing had stopped simultaneously. At that moment, the young man whom Dr. Masaki had pointed out—Kure Ichirou’s retreating figure—suddenly turned around, as though he had received some sort of suggestion. Through the glass window we were peering into, he met my gaze perfectly… and… the smile that had lingered on his face until now vanished in an instant… transforming into an astonished expression indistinguishable from my own face I had seen earlier that morning in the bathhouse mirror. ...A round face, large eyes, a thin jaw... Before I could process this, he turned back toward where the old man was working the field, once again wearing a beaming smile... or so it seemed...

……Before I knew it, I was covering my face with both hands.

“……Kure Ichirou is… I am… I…” While shouting this, I staggered backward unsteadily… or so it seemed… Dr. Masaki caught me. He then poured a pungent, fiery liquid that stung my tongue—something that made me choke—into my mouth in great gulps… or so I think… though I don’t clearly remember what exactly happened. Only the words Dr. Masaki had been shouting near my ear remained in my memory, fragmented and incomplete.

“Get a grip. Steady now. And take another good look at that young man’s face. There there… You mustn’t tremble like that. Don’t be so shocked. There’s nothing strange about this at all… Get a grip. Steady now… That young man looking exactly like you—it’s only natural. It’s something perfectly possible both academically and logically… Calm down… calm yourself… There there…”

At that moment, I thought it was a wonder I hadn’t fainted outright. Perhaps by then I had grown accustomed to various strange occurrences through repeated exposure, yet even so, it must have taken me countless instances of closing and opening my eyes while desperately trying—bit by bit—to call back my soul that had begun scattering and fading to some distant place, wiping my face with a handkerchief all the while, before I could make myself stand steadfastly before the glass window again. And yet, even then, I simply couldn’t muster the courage to look out the window again. Lowering my head to stare fixedly at the linoleum floor, releasing trembling sigh after trembling sigh, I kept exhaling the intense whiskey aroma that burned across my tongue again and again.

Dr. Masaki slipped the flat whiskey bottle he had been holding into his lab coat pocket in the meantime. Then he cleared his throat as though finally settling himself.

“No. “It’s no wonder you’re shocked.” “That young man is the same age as you—born in the same month, on the same day, at the same hour—from the same woman’s womb.”

“Wh... what...?”

With that cry, I glared at Dr. Masaki’s face. At the same time, I felt as though I was beginning to understand everything, and I finally mustered the courage to turn back toward Kure Ichirou outside the window. “S-so… then… I and that Kure Ichirou are twins…”

“No… That’s not it…” Dr. Masaki shook his head sternly. “You share a connection far deeper than twins… This is no mere chance resemblance either.” “Tha… that’s impossible…” Before I could finish speaking, my mind became a jumble once more. I stared into Dr. Masaki’s black eyes beneath his pince-nez—his face beginning to twist into a sardonic smile. Was this mockery or sincerity…? I wondered…

A pitying smile toward me rapidly emerged on Dr. Masaki's face. He nodded again and again while drawing in cigar smoke and blowing it back out. "Uh-huh. It's only natural you're confused... You've been suffering since long ago from that famous Soul Separation illness recorded in old texts..."

“Wh... Soul Separation…?” “...That’s right. Soul Separation refers to when another self manifests and acts differently from oneself—a phenomenon recorded in various texts as ghost stories since antiquity. But from the perspective of a mental science specialist like myself, this is something academically plausible.” “Yet seeing it materialize before your very eyes must feel indescribably uncanny.” I frantically rubbed my eyes again. Peering timidly through the window... the young man stood rigidly in his original position as before. This time he revealed a sliver of his profile...

"...Is that me... Kure Ichirou... or me... which one is Kure Ichirou..."

“Hahahahaha! It seems you simply can’t remember, can you?” “You still haven’t managed to awaken from the dream, have you?”

“Wh-what... a dream... I'm the dream...”

I turned around with my eyes widened into perfect circles. I looked up and down at Dr. Masaki, who was arching his back triumphantly. “That’s right. “You’re in a dream right now.” “As proof it’s a dream—when I look with my own eyes—that liberation therapy field has been empty all along without a single soul in it.” “Just five or six paulownia trees with dead leaves standing there… The liberation therapy field has been strictly closed since yesterday’s major incident broke out, you see…”

“......” “It’s like this… Listen carefully. This requires a somewhat technical explanation. In your consciousness, what’s currently awake and active consists mostly of sensory functions related to reality. Namely—seeing present facts, hearing them, smelling them, tasting them, sensing them. Processing those. Functions like remembering… The part that recalls past memories as ‘it was like this’ or ‘it was like that’ remains only half-awake enough to dream. ...So when you peer through this window at the scene inside, in that instant, your memory of having stood there rigidly until yesterday revives to the level of a dream—becoming a clear phantom matching what you now see—surfacing within your consciousness. Thus it appears overlapping with your current consciousness standing there. In other words, the you standing outside the window is an objective image of your own past that emerged from your memories as a dream—while the you inside this glass pane is your current subjective consciousness. You’re seeing both dream and reality simultaneously… at this very moment...”

I rubbed my eyes firmly once more. Blinking repeatedly, I glared at Dr. Masaki’s strange smiling face.

"...Then... I... am indeed Kure Ichirou..." “...That’s right. “Both theoretically and practically speaking, you must inevitably become the young man who calls himself Kure Ichirou. “It’s only natural you find this strange, but there’s no helping it. “So... if on top of that you were to completely restore your own past memories to clear reality—not merely the dreamlike state you’re seeing now—then unfortunately, this experiment would mark Dr. Wakabayashi’s great victory and my defeat... Though whether that’s truly the case remains unclear until we see the results.” “Hff hff...”

“.............” “...Anyway, it’s bizarrely grotesque, isn’t it? Bizarrely mysterious and unfathomable, isn’t it? However, when explained academically, this is nothing out of the ordinary. Even ordinary people often experience such things when their minds are fatigued or when suffering from neurasthenia—though of a milder degree... Someone might walk along busy midday streets while vividly recalling scenes from the previous night—being fawned over by women and basking in popularity—grinning to themselves... Or while traversing a lonely road, they might suddenly hallucinate that moment when they nearly got hit by a streetcar and jolt to a halt. As for women, they might flush while recreating their bridal appearance in an old mirror from their trousseau, or absentmindedly end up before the gates of a school they have no business with anymore while chasing after the lingering shadows of their schoolgirl memories... There must be various other examples as well. It is precisely through the same psychology by which one depicts scenes of their own future funeral in dreams that you are now peering at two overlapping layers—the false image produced by objective memories of your past and the true image reflected in your current subjective consciousness. Moreover, in your case, the coma affecting the part of your brain that’s dreaming is far deeper than ordinary sleep, so the hallucinations within the liberation therapy field appear extremely vivid to you now—exactly as you’re seeing them. Just as with dreams during deep sleep, these hallucinations press upon you with a charm no different from reality... no, even deeper than that—making it exceedingly difficult to distinguish them from your conscious reality.”

“.............” “...Moreover, as I just said—since this seems to be a dream being shown to you by a certain part of your brain functions that have long been in a comatose state within your head, gradually reviving itself bit by bit starting from memories of very recent events—it may well be that you still won’t wake for some time... When you do awaken—likely at the moment when the you outside the window and the you currently here mutually realize ‘Ah, this is myself’—you’ll either jolt awake in shock or faint into consciousness... But by then, this room, myself, and even your current self may all vanish in an instant... only for you to discover yourself in some preposterous place with a preposterous appearance... In fact, when you nearly fainted earlier, I truly thought you were about to awaken at last... Hahahahaha!”

“.............”

Without realizing it, I had closed my eyes again and was listening only to Dr. Masaki’s voice. Overwhelmed anew by the twofold—no, threefold—unfathomable meanings layered within his words, I stood desperately digging my heels into the ground. Trembling at the thought everything might disappear if I opened my eyes, I cautiously worked my tongue inside my parched mouth.

That was when it happened. When my right hand, which had been almost unconsciously pressing against my head, moved down just as unconsciously to the hairline at my forehead, I suddenly felt a pain that seemed to seep through my spine... I involuntarily let out an “Ah!” I closed my already shut eyes even tighter and clenched my teeth. Then, as I continued to carefully rub the spot, it seemed slightly swollen—perhaps my imagination—but it didn’t appear to be an actual swelling. It was indeed a mark from having strongly collided with something or been struck... Until this very moment, I hadn’t felt such pain... And yet, between this morning and now, I had no recollection of having struck my head so violently even once...

This must be what they mean by dreaming within a dream. I gently pressed my hand over the throbbing spot and, keeping my eyes tightly shut, shook my head vigorously from side to side. With the resolve of someone leaping off a sheer cliff, I resolutely snapped my eyes wide open and scrutinized my surroundings... yet nothing had changed from when my eyes were closed. Only the shadow of a large black kite that had been circling above the liberation therapy field once more swept swiftly across the sandy ground within the compound.

When I saw that, I couldn’t help but realize everything had to be reality. Even if it were some incredibly mysterious or terrifying overlapping of psychoscientific phenomena, for me personally, it was neither dream nor waking reality. I had no choice but to be convinced I was truly seeing real forms with these eyes and hearing real sounds with these ears. ...I couldn’t bring myself to doubt that conviction by even a speck. I found myself able to stare coldly once more at Kure Ichirou—the young man outside the window who resembled me so closely he might have been another self—without feeling the slightest fear. Then as I slowly turned back to Dr. Masaki, he immediately narrowed his eyes and bared his dentures back to the molars.

“Ha ha ha ha! You still don’t understand even after all these hints? Can’t you see yourself as Kure Ichirou?” I wordlessly nodded firmly. “Ha ha ha! Magnificent! Truly magnificent! Actually... everything I just said... was all lies...” “Wh... Lies...” As I uttered this, I involuntarily let go of the hand that had been clutching my head. With both hands dangling limply... my mouth hanging agape... I remained facing Dr. Masaki, eyes wide and staring—likely frozen in the exact posture of the character 呆 (“dumbfounded”)......

Right before my eyes, Dr. Masaki clutched his stomach as if he couldn’t contain himself. From his small frame, he began to laugh maniacally, wringing out the loudest possible voice. Choking on cigar smoke, loosening his necktie, undoing his vest buttons, adjusting his pince-nez, he continued laughing uproariously—throwing his head back and doubling over so violently that with each guffaw, it seemed the very air in the room might vanish and reappear. “Wahahahaha!” “This is absolutely exhilarating!” “You’re so thoroughly honest—it’s amusing.” “Ahahahahahaha!” “Ah, absurd… ah, unbearable… you mustn’t resent me… everything I’ve said until now isn’t just lies—it’s a crimson gold-leafed fabrication… ah… ah… but I never meant any harm by it.” “The truth is, I took advantage of that young man… Kure Ichirou… being your spitting image to conduct a little test on your mind.”

“M-My... testing my head...”

“That’s right.” “To tell you the truth, I intend to explain to you the true nature of Kure Ichirou’s psychological hereditary deadlock from here on out—but even more incomprehensible matters will keep arising one after another.” “Unless you keep your head extremely steady, there’s a danger you’ll fall into some absurd delusion.” “In fact, even now, if you were to start believing that young man over there is ‘undoubtedly my twin’ or some such notion, the logical flow of my explanation would become completely tangled and ruined. That’s why I attempted a little preventive injection, so to speak.” “Ahahahaha!”

I took a deep breath as if waking from a dream. Even now, shuddering under the force of Dr. Masaki’s eloquence, I once again moved my hand to the painful spot on my head. "But... this spot on my head... why has it suddenly... started throbbing..." Having said that, I fell silent. Fearing I might be laughed at again, I timidly blinked my eyes.

However, Dr. Masaki did not laugh. As though he had known all along that such a painful spot existed atop my head, he continued in a nonchalant tone, "Hmm... That pain?"

Having had that declared, I felt even more uneasy than if I had been laughed at.

“It’s... it’s not that it started hurting suddenly now. It’s been there since before you woke up this morning—you just hadn’t noticed until now.” “But... but...” With my still-trembling fingers, I bent each one deliberately before Dr. Masaki. “Since this morning... the barber once... the nurse once... and before that I myself touched this spot over and over... at least ten times or more... but it didn’t hurt at all...”

“No matter how many times you scratched at it, it’s all the same.” “As long as you believe yourself to be completely unrelated to Kure Ichirou—a total stranger—you feel no pain, but once you realize that Kure’s appearance and your own are perfect duplicates, you suddenly recall that pain.” “…Herein manifests mental science’s mysterious rational workings… Since all phenomena in the universe are merely mental-scientific existences oriented toward ‘spirit,’ this irrefutably demonstrates phenomena that materialistic science can never—not absolutely nor eternally—explain. It’s a monstrously convoluted knot, that… In short, your headache is intimately connected to Kure Ichirou’s ultimate psychological hereditary episode.” “You see, last night Kure Ichirou fully manifested his psychological heredity to its ultimate limit and attempted suicide by bashing his head against a wall.” “That pain currently remains in your head.”

"...Huh... Huh... Then... I... am after all Kure Ichirou..."

“Mama… Well now, don’t get so flustered… The horsefly’s heart knows not the bee’s.” “The pig’s heart knows not the dog’s.” “It’s common sense that even if Zhang San gets hit on the head, Li Si feels neither pain nor anything else.” “In other words, that’s the materialistic scientific way of thinking, but...” Dr. Masaki suddenly spat out these enigmatic words along with puffs of cigar smoke. While I was still struggling to comprehend their meaning and floundering in bewilderment, he began to smirk, squinting one eye and furrowing his brow.

“And yet… by what workings of mental science does the headache of Kure Ichirou—who seems to you now a complete stranger—persist upon your own parietal bone…?” I turned once more toward the window and found myself compelled to stare at Kure Ichirou’s figure standing rigidly in a corner of the liberation therapy field, grinning all the while. Moreover, at that very moment, my headache began throbbing vividly with a mysterious pulsation, and I couldn’t help but feel it had sprung to life anew.

Before those eyes, Dr. Masaki blew out another enormous cloud of smoke. “...How about it? Do you think you can resolve this question yourself?” “I can’t.”

“I can’t,” I responded firmly. While clutching my head... I began feeling the same wretchedness as when I awoke that morning... “If you can’t do it, there’s nothing to be done. You may remain forever a drifter—unknown and rootless.” My chest suddenly constricted. It felt like the sorrow of a child led by the hand through unfamiliar streets, only to have that hand abruptly release them and vanish. Unthinkingly, I removed my hands from my head and clasped them together. “Please tell me... Doctor,” I pleaded as if in prayer.

“Please tell me… Doctor.” “Please… I’m begging you… If I encounter any more strange things, I’ll die.”

“Don’t talk such cowardly nonsense. “Hahahaha. “No need to change your eye color like that—I’ll tell you.” “Please… Who am I… I…” “Wait… Before making you understand that, there’s one promise I must have you make.” “Wh… whatever promise… I’ll keep it.” The smile vanished from Dr. Masaki’s face. He sucked back the smoke he was about to exhale and stared fixedly at my face. “…You’ll definitely keep it…?”

“I’ll definitely keep it… What kind of promise is…” Dr. Masaki’s face once again bore his characteristic sardonic sneer. “What? If you listen with your current firm conviction that ‘I’m definitely not Kure Ichirou, no matter how mistaken anyone might be,’ then I don’t think it’s a particularly burdensome promise… In other words, I intend to proceed with an extraordinary account of Kure Ichirou’s psychogenetic case, delving into every last detail—but will you endure listening to its conclusion, no matter how terrifying… or… inconceivable its contents may be?”

“I will listen.” “Hmm… And once I finish speaking—at the very moment you acknowledge this entire account contains not a single falsehood—it will become your lifelong obligation to record these facts and publish them alongside my will… your great responsibility to humanity… So when you understand this, will you carry it out without fail exactly as such, even should it prove an intolerable burden… even should it fill you with dread?”

“I swear.” “Hmm… And one more thing… When that time comes, it will simultaneously become clear that you naturally bear the responsibility to marry that woman in Room Six and eliminate the cause of her current mental disorder—but can you fulfill such obligations as required?” “……Does such responsibility truly… lie with me?” “You can think about that yourself when the time comes… In any case, whether such responsibility exists or not… To put it another way, the method for clarifying why Kure Ichirou’s headache has migrated to your forehead is exceedingly simple and clear.” “It probably won’t take more than five minutes.”

“That’s… That’s such a simple method?”

“Ah, it’s a trifling matter.” “Moreover, the logic is simple enough for a grade schooler to grasp—there’s no need for me to add even a single word of explanation.” “All you need to do is go to a certain place and firmly shake hands with a certain person.” “Then there—as I anticipate—a certain marvelous mental science phenomenon will flash forth like lightning… ‘Oh! So that’s it… I was such a person all along…’ And at the very moment you think this, you may truly faint this time.” “It might even occur before you shake hands, you know.”

“……So I can’t do that now……?” “You mustn’t. “It’s absolutely forbidden. “If you were to realize who you are now, you’d fall into an outlandish delusion as I described—risking complete destruction of my experiment. “Therefore, unless you fully grasp all facts, take precisely the measures I direct to compile them into a public record, and I personally witness this process, I cannot conduct that experiment. “…How about it. “Can you… keep that promise…?”

“I… can… do it…”

“Very well… Then let’s talk… No.” The conversation had grown ridiculously formal. “Come over here…” Even as he spoke, Dr. Masaki forcefully pulled my hand and led me to the large desk, seating me there. He then sat facing me in the old swivel armchair, took a match from his white coat pocket, and lit a fresh cigar. He tapped the short stub into the mouth of the Daruma ashtray.

As I could no longer see outside the window, I felt as though a hot burden had been lifted. I could clearly feel, at the very center of my head, the multitude of questions that seemed utterly insoluble growing ever more intense and entangled…………. "No. The conversation's gotten absurdly stiff." Having repeated this once more with deliberate affectation, Dr. Masaki adopted a far more casual attitude than before and planted both elbows on the desk. Resting his chin atop them, he peered into my face with a sly grin, a long cigar clamped sideways in his mouth.

“So, how about it? Setting aside for now the question of who you yourself are—what do you think of that girl you saw this morning?” Unable to grasp the meaning of the question, I blinked my eyes repeatedly. “What do you think… you mean…” “Didn’t you think she was beautiful?” Caught off guard by this sudden question from an unexpected direction, I could not help but be flustered. The countless large and small “?” symbols that had been swarming like midges through my mind vanished all at once. In their place floated before my eyes—those black glistening eyes… small crimson lips… long blue crescent eyebrows… ears faintly veiled in downy hair… No sooner had these visions appeared than I felt a growing warmth around my neck. As this happened, the intoxication from the whiskey I had been forced to drink when nearly fainting earlier began rapidly coursing through my body, and I instinctively wiped my face with a handkerchief. I felt as though steam were rising from every pore of my face….

Dr. Masaki nodded with his chin while maintaining his sly grin. “Hmm... I thought so... I thought so. A young man who can calmly answer when asked whether that girl is beautiful is either one of those delinquents worn out from love games or a descendant of the sexually impotent patients that appear in *The Eight Dog Chronicles* and *The Water Margin*… But you—didn’t you feel anything at all about that girl beyond that?” To tell the truth, I do not wish to record my state of mind at this time here. But... I cannot falsify the facts. It was only due to being questioned in this manner by Dr. Masaki that I now realized for the first time that my feelings toward that girl had not advanced a single step beyond when I first met her this morning. I had simply been struck by her uncannily innocent freshness and a tormenting beauty too unbearable to behold. All I had been thinking was that I wanted to somehow restore her sanity… rescue her from this hospital… let her meet the young man who felt that way about her. And whether that was truly a "transformation" of "expressions of love" toward her... I had no time to consider such things. No... I had even considered delving any deeper into dissecting my own heart as a blasphemy against her, remaining vigilant in the deepest recesses of my mind... Feeling as though Dr. Masaki had hit upon that very mark, I found myself blushing without any means of resistance. I had turned as stiff as stone and responded curtly.

“Uh... I thought... she was pitiable.”

When Dr. Masaki heard this, he nodded repeatedly with evident satisfaction. Seeing this attitude, it appeared Dr. Masaki had convinced himself I was in love with that girl at this very moment, but I lacked the mental composure to refute it. As I anxiously racked my brains about how to prevent misunderstanding, Dr. Masaki kept nodding leisurely with meticulous care. “Naturally you would, naturally you would.” “Thinking her beautiful means you’ve fallen in love.” “Those who deny this are mere pretenders to morality…”

“Th-that’s so... rash... Pr-professor... It’s a misunderstanding...” Flustered, I shouted while raising the hand that held the handkerchief.

"The heart that perceives beauty in the opposite sex, romantic love, affection, and carnal desire—they are all separate things. Such love that jumbles those together is illusionary love... It's blasphemy against the opposite sex... It's an unbecomingly reckless way of speaking for a psychologist... Utter nonsense. That is…" All manner of such refutations flashed through my mind at once… However, Dr. Masaki continued to grin slyly without so much as a twitch.

“I know, I know. “You needn’t explain yourself. “While you might find it troublesome having that girl fall for you, just leave it to me. “Whether you love that girl or not, entrust it to fate. “Now listen well to how this headache of yours that’s emerged to settle fate’s conclusion connects with that girl in whatever relationship... though the pairing may seem rather awkward. “...For as you hear this unfold, you’ll understand that from both legal and moral perspectives, you and that girl stand facing each other along a single line of fate. “The fact that you must marry her the moment you leave this hospital will become clear point by point as all contradictions and mysteries resolve themselves.”

As I listened to Dr. Masaki's words, I found myself slumped heavily once more... Yet this was not a bowing of the head from blushing. My state of mind at that moment was far beyond mere blushing. From within all the inexplicable facts contained in Dr. Masaki's words, how was I to discover the focal point that would resolve my current predicament? Once again, I desperately closed my eyes and clenched my teeth. I began recalling the events since that morning in order, pondering them as they came to mind and analyzing them as I pondered.

...Drs. Masaki and Wakabayashi, while pretending on the surface to be inseparable close friends, were in reality sworn enemies holding deep mutual animosity. ...The cause of their discord appeared to stem from psychological research using myself and Kure Ichirou as experimental subjects, and now that conflict had surged to the point where their battle was being conducted openly in this very classroom even in broad daylight. ...However, when it came to their determination to forcibly marry me off to that girl in Room Six, the two of them seemed to strangely align.

...Moreover, if by some one-in-ten-thousand chance I were either the same person as that Kure Ichirou or a young man sharing his name, age, and appearance—and if that girl were indeed Kure Moyoko—then this would become truly preposterous. In other words, it seemed there could be no one other than these two doctors who had ensnared us on the eve of that marriage through some criminally psychological means and plunged us into such a wretched fate. ...Could such a contradictory thing possibly exist elsewhere?

Though if I were to forcibly attempt an interpretation, it wouldn't be impossible to conceive one. One could theoretically consider that the two doctors—for some academic research purpose—deliberately made complete strangers into mental patients: a girl and one of twins or something similar, plunging them into an elaborate illusion to make them genuinely fall in love... However, no matter how I looked at it, such an utterly cruel and immoral, bizarre academic experiment could never be conducted through human hearts and human hands.

...Where could such contradictions and incomprehensible elements have originated from? ...Why were those two doctors causing such an uproar centered around me... ...And... Yet ultimately, it proved a futile endeavor. The more I thought this way, the more everything tangled together; the more I speculated, the more everything became hopelessly knotted in inexplicability. Finally reaching a point where I could neither think nor conjecture any longer, I simply sat there rigidly closing my eyes—imagining my own form within my mind like a stone statue furrowing its brows and biting its lips...

...Knock knock... Knock knock... The sound of knocking on the door...

I opened my eyes with a start and stared at the entrance door as if possessed by some nightmare. I wondered if it might be Dr. Wakabayashi... but Dr. Masaki, without even turning his head and still propping his cheek on his hand, shouted with startling volume. "Hey... Get in here—!" No sooner had his voice finished echoing through the room than someone began jiggling the doorknob. The person who entered while pushing the door halfway open turned out to be a janitor from Kyushu Imperial University wearing a navy blue uniform, his bald head gleaming under the light. Though clearly advanced in years and bent nearly double at the waist, he carried a sooty earthenware teapot and two crude cups on a lacquered tray in his right hand while balancing a dish piled high with castella cake in his left. Shuffling unsteadily toward the large desk, he set these before Dr. Masaki, who watched with a look of bemusement. As if haunted by some unseen force, the janitor nervously ducked his bald head before raising it again with hands clasped in supplication. His clouded eyes darted back and forth between Dr. Masaki and myself until he executed another absurdly deep bow that brought his fingertips grazing the floorboards.

"Heh-heh, today’s truly fine weather we’re having… Heh-heh… This here, well, it’s from the Dean-sama’s errand, see… Orders were to present you both with some tea accompaniments, if you please… Heh-heh…" “Ahahahaha! Is that so? Did Wakabayashi send this over? Hmm… Well, thank you for your trouble. Did Wakabayashi bring this himself?” “Y-yes… Well, you see, Dean-sama has been on the phone since earlier, inquiring whether Dr. Masaki was still present. I was so startled—not knowing what to do, I said I’d just come take a quick look. When I came to outside the room, I heard both your voices.” “So when I reported that to Dean-sama, he said he’d have some things sent over later for you to have with your tea, if you please… Heh…”

“Yeah. “I see, I see.” “Received it.” “If you’re free, tell him to come talk over the phone.” “Nah, thanks for your trouble… No need to lock the entrance.” “Heh-heh… I hadn’t the slightest idea you both were here… Since it’s just me alone today, I haven’t even done the cleaning yet… Truly remiss of me… I deeply apologize… Heh-heh…” The old janitor poured and served tea before the two of them with precarious movements, then left after bowing repeatedly, his bald head gleaming.

After seeing him off and confirming that the door had closed, Dr. Masaki suddenly leaned forward, grabbed a piece of castella with his hand, stuffed it into his mouth in one bite, and gulped down the hot tea. Then he shot me a look as if to say, "Eat."

However, I did not move. With my hands clasped in my lap and eyes wide open, I watched Dr. Masaki's actions. My attention remained fixed on the doctors' tension - this clash between them sparking with some hidden significance I couldn't grasp...

“Hahahaha! There’s no need for you to feel so creeped out. This is precisely why I love scoundrels! That bastard figured out I’ve been pulling an all-nighter since last night without eating a thing. So he sent over my favorite Nagasaki castella and put on airs like Uesugi Kenshin. It’s just ordinary stuff sold for hospital visitors out front—nothing to worry about. No cat repellent or anything mixed in. Hahahahaha!”

As he was saying this, he shoved two or three more pieces into his mouth and gulped down the tea one after another. “Ah—delicious! Now then—how about you? I’ll press onward shortly—but first—have you no lingering questions regarding those two episodes of Kure Ichirou’s attacks we just reviewed?”

“There are.” I parroted back my response. However, that response flew out in a clear voice I hadn’t anticipated, creating a loud reverberation throughout the room, and I found myself startled by my own reaction. Involuntarily, I straightened up and tightened my lower abdomen. It was a small commotion that had just occurred before my eyes—perhaps due to this castella incident, my feelings, which had been deadlocked until now, were suddenly transformed. Or perhaps the whiskey I had been made to drink when I nearly fainted earlier was finally showing its true effect at this moment—but in any case, hearing my own reply echo “Waaaan” through the room before vanishing suddenly filled me with emboldened resolve as I gulped down a cup of hot tea… Ah, but how delicious that tea was!… As I repeatedly savored the fragrant aroma spreading warmly from my tongue down to my esophagus, I felt all my joints relax limply while my blood circulation began improving steadily throughout my body. My mind loosened, my head grew emptily light, and without thinking, I licked my wet lips as I stared fixedly at Dr. Masaki’s face. Whiskey-scented, hot breath blew out with a fu—— sound as...

"...No matter how you twist the logic, I can never accept myself as Kure Ichirou..."

I felt like declaring in a loud voice while... Then, strangely enough, all the various events that had occurred to me up until that very moment began seeming as though they had happened to a complete stranger, growing indescribably fascinating. Everything I had seen and heard since morning now swirled before my eyes like peering through a kaleidoscope, taking on an ineffable allure and vividness—and at that instant, the two doctors who until moments ago had appeared as utterly dangerous adversaries not only ceased being frightening at all but began looking like wondrously intriguing playthings.

...The two doctors must be making some colossal blunder. ...This whole affair might turn out to be an absurdly farcical comedy beyond imagination. "There's a young man who's my exact double—both of us stricken with some fantastical mental illness. Our identities got tangled up beyond recognition, and now these two doctors are grunting and straining to tell us apart through their competition—but they're utterly stumped. In their desperation, they've resorted to pinning whichever fiancée belongs to whichever twin just to wrap things up neatly—using every trick in the book to claim credit for themselves. Doesn't this whole mess resemble some outrageously absurd theatrical plot? ...How laughable... Once I confirm this must be the case, it won't matter whether these quacks are friend or foe—no matter how diabolically clever their schemes against me prove, I'll face them without flinching. I must plunge into this mystery until I grasp its true nature myself—anything less would be self-deception. And when I finally unearth this affair's rotten core, save that girl from this asylum hellscape, and wipe those smug grins off the doctors' faces—oh, what glorious vindication that'll be..."

……my feelings had transformed into a recklessly bold, buoyant mood. ……The refreshing brightness inside the room……the blue-green of pine trees filling the window pane……the midday stillness suffused within it all—now, belatedly, felt pleasantly, seeping into my very being. However, I think that such a transformation within my mind had occurred in just a matter of a few seconds. When I soon came back to myself, Dr. Masaki was gazing at my face over his nose glasses with a grin, leaning back with both hands behind his head. As if waiting for my question…

I faltered for a moment. In any case, there were far too many things I wanted to ask… But deciding it didn’t matter where I started, I took up the will before me and began flipping through its pages. When I eventually reached the very end of the excerpts from the case records, I pointed to that section and showed it to Dr. Masaki. “It says here… ‘Insert photographic reproductions of this illustrated scroll and its origin account…’” “And what has become of the actual scroll?”

“Ah! “That…” Before he could finish speaking, Dr. Masaki lowered both hands and slammed the edge of the large desk with a thud. “...I was careless there.” “Ha. Ha. Ha.” “I became so engrossed in trying to restore your memory that I forgot to show you the most crucial item.” “You can’t comprehend the true nature of Kure Ichirou’s psychological heredity without seeing this.” “My will too is like fashioning a Buddha statue without enlivening it with a soul.” “Hahahahaha… No, what a blunder! What a blunder!” “Perhaps my mind’s grown somewhat muddled from sleep deprivation… No.” “Let me present it to you immediately.” “This… it’s right here.”

Dr. Masaki said this while scratching his head and, extending one hand, pulled over the merino-cloth-wrapped bundle lying beside him. He deftly untied the knot, pulled out a rectangular newspaper-wrapped item and a bound volume of Western large-format ruled paper about two inches thick from within, then deliberately carried them to the north window where he spread out the cloth.

“Pfft... pfft... This dust is terrible. “It’s been thrown into the stove’s hole and left there for ages… Now then, look here. “This bound volume contains Wakabayashi’s full investigation report on the Meinohama Incident—the original source of those excerpts you read. “That consumptive’s razor-sharp nerves drove him to investigate with two-fold, three-fold layers of crystalline thoroughness—absolutely overwhelming. “So even if you do read it, we’ll have you go through it properly later. For today, let’s start by having you examine this illustrated scroll and its origin account… Though come to think of it, perhaps you should read the origin account first. “It would prove more interesting to view the scroll afterward, I imagine…”

As these words were spoken, the newspaper wrapping was opened, and a bound volume of about one notebook's worth of Japanese paper, placed atop an unpainted wooden box inside, was tossed carelessly before me. "That is a copy of the origin account serving as the colophon for this illustrated scroll." "In other words, this documents the very roots of Kure Ichirou's psychological heredity that began with events predating Kisaragi Temple's origin legend—occurring from about 1,100 years ago. But whether you clearly recall having read this before long ago in such a place...Hmm...or not will indeed determine the life-or-death divide between Wakabayashi and myself. Right?" "Right?" "If even a single iota of memory from reading that remains in your head, then you must indeed be Kure Ichirou...Hahaha...Just go ahead and read it." "No need to hold back." "It's a splendidly interesting story..."

I was fully aware a hundred times over of how precious the contents of those documents were... Moreover, I had perceived all too keenly the grave and profound significance of the psychoscientific experiment that Dr. Masaki was attempting on me through those very documents... Yet it was strange how not a shred of such tension could take hold within me. Perhaps the whiskey I had just drunk was having some effect, but mimicking Dr. Masaki’s carefree manner all the same, I casually picked up the bound volume and just as casually flipped to its first page—only to find square Chinese characters packed densely in jet-black ink, leaving no gaps between them.

“Whoa.” “This is Classical Chinese... and unannotated text at that.” “No punctuation marks, kana suffixes—nothing’s attached... I can’t read this at all.” “This is...”

“Hmm. “Is that so.” “Hmm, well then I’ll have to recount its general contents from my own memory for now.” “Please do proceed with that.” “...Ugh...” Dr. Masaki sighed and leaned back. Still wearing his slippers, he climbed onto the chair and hugged his knees before turning sharply southward. Half-opening his eyes as if organizing his thoughts through the window’s light, he softly exhaled a wisp of blue smoke.

Whether it was due to the whiskey having gone to my head, I found myself growing vaguely weary and sleepy as I propped both elbows on the desk and rested my chin upon them. “...*Burp*... U-ii... And then, you see—” “Now then, speaking of Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty—this story begins exactly about 1,100 years ago.” “In the waning years of Emperor Xuanzong’s reign—specifically the fourteenth year of Tianbao—a man named An Lushan raised a rebellion. Then in the first month of the following year, An Lushan presumptuously declared himself emperor; by the sixth month, his rebel forces breached Tongguan Pass, and the Emperor fled to meet his end at Mawei.” “Yang Guozhong and Yang Guifei submitted to execution... as recorded in the Chronicle.”

“Ah... You remember that so well, Doctor...” “The dull parts of history are what you end up memorizing… Now then, while chronicles confirmed Emperor Xuanzong’s death in Tianbao’s fifteenth year as stated, seven years prior—during Tianbao’s eighth year—a seventeen or eighteen-year-old youth named Wu Qingxiu, a scholar from Fanyang, entered the Shu region by command of Emperor Xuanzong. Shouldering his colored brushes, he depicted the Jialing River’s waters, crossed the Wushan Gorge, sailed upstream along the Yangtze to explore its marvels, then returned and presented five scrolls containing over a hundred collected landscapes for imperial tribute.” The Emperor praised this achievement and bestowed upon him Dai, daughter of the late Hanlin Academician Fang Jiulian. “Dai was Fen’s elder sister and they were twins.” “They became ladies-in-waiting to Consort Yang together.” People of the time called them the Twin Butterflies of Huāqīng Palace. At that time, in March of the fourteenth year of Tianbao. Wu Qingxiu was twenty-five years old. “Lady Dai was seventeen years old at the time.”

“Well now, this is astonishing!” “I simply can’t remember it all.” “Is that also from the chronicle?”

“No. “This is different. The circumstances surrounding ‘the bestowing of Lady Dai’ appear in a novel called *Peony Pavilion Secret History*. That novel contains scenes like Emperor Xuanzong and Yang Guifei whispering sweet nothings at Peony Pavilion while the poet Li Bai drools as he watches from beneath peony leaves—a typically saccharine Chinese-style romance. Yet despite that, the opening section describing Wu Qingxiu matches this origin account word for word without a single discrepancy—fascinating stuff. I’m thinking of having those literature students research it eventually—first off, it’s such exceptional writing that you end up memorizing it without even realizing.”

“Is that so...” “But somehow, these Classical Chinese-style narratives seem hard to follow just by ear.” “I need to look at each character one by one...” “Yeah.” “Alright then, let’s soften our approach.” “Please... I’d appreciate it.”

“Hahahahaha.” “In short, this old man Emperor Xuanzong—to the extent he’s depicted in festival lantern paintings alongside Yang Guifei—is the most derelict of emperors throughout history.” “He pacified the barbarians, ruled the realm, separated soldiers from farmers, banned debased coinage… and up to that point, all was well and good. But once Yang Guifei had him wrapped around her finger, he started rubber-stamping every whim—promoting her brother Yang Guozhong and that whole gang of worthless cronies to high offices one after another.” “In other words, he drove out loyal retainers, surrounded himself with treacherous ministers, and sang the Taiping Ballad of peace—that’s how it went, eh?” “In the end, he built a bath inlaid with gold, silver, and jewels inside this not-even-particularly-grand palace called Lishan Palace, drew in a jewel-like hot spring, jumped in with Consort Yang… ‘With you, my dear, anywhere at all…’ That’s how it went, eh?”

“Whoa. That’s too simplified... Well then—” “That’s too simplified.” “Well then—” “No.” “You’ve got to listen properly.” “There’s not even a speck of that Chan-kou-grade nonsense mixed in here.” “This is the original source of that popular song *Dokomademo* that was all the rage four or five years back.” “It’s properly recorded in the annals.” “...Huh.” “Is that how it is?”

“Damn right. First off, if I were with you, I wouldn’t go to some uncouth place like the Sahara or Niagara. We’d ascend to heaven together and become twin stars aligned in the firmament—making every soul below green with envy till kingdom come! It’s enough to make you sick just thinking about it. Though I reckon that eavesdropping bastard’s long since kicked the bucket...” “But what does any of that have to do with the Illustrated Scroll?” “Everything. Now don’t get ahead of yourself—listen properly. This continental tale’s got more twists than a dragon’s tail. You see... Emperor Xuanzong being that cultured sort of ruler adored all things artistic—doted on that drunken bald poet Li Bai like a lapdog—while ordering some eighteen or nineteen-year-old scholar-artist named Wu Qingxiu to sketch every blessed scenic spot across the realm. His Majesty’s grand idea was to tour the empire without leaving his throne... though word has it Her Ladyship Consort Yang put him up to it.”

“So that young man was a genius at painting...”

“Of course.” “Despite being just eighteen or nineteen, this youth painted works rivaling the poetry of Li Bai—that famously bald-headed great poet of all ages—so his skills were no amateur matter.” “Unfortunately, due to his ill fortune and early death, neither his name nor his works remain in large numbers.” “As I mentioned before, while these matters are of course recorded in documents from that era and are indeed noted in recent chronicles as well, the dates and names differ slightly across texts, making it impossible to ascertain anything with certainty.” “However, since there exists physical evidence here documenting these details in full, future historians will have to acknowledge this as fact.”

“So then, that Illustrated Scroll is an exceedingly valuable reference material, I see.” “Valuable? That’s underselling it… But to return slightly—that young scholar-artist Wu Qingxiu had spent nearly six years traveling on sketching expeditions by His Majesty’s command. When he finally returned to Chang’an in Tianbao 14th Year after so long away, the landscape scrolls he brought back as souvenirs so delighted His Majesty that not only did Wu achieve the utmost honor as an artist, but he also received a lovely wife named Lady Daizi.” “Moreover, he was even granted a beautiful, compact residence with a private garden where he could live undisturbed—a veritable cascade of blessings—so for a time, he lived as if in a waking dream.” Yet as he gradually settled into this life, he noticed that the times had entered a prelude to the Great Tang Dynasty’s collapse—ominous signs and supernatural calamities arose incessantly, with portents of great turmoil overflowing everywhere. “Moreover, no matter how earnestly His Majesty’s attendants admonished him, it proved as futile as pounding nails into bran—those who inadvertently displeased him were falsely accused and executed one after another… Witnessing this, Wu Qingxiu sighed deeply and resolved to use the power of his artistic brushwork to awaken His Majesty from delusions and restore the nation to stability like Mount Tai. Thus, he confessed his innermost thoughts to his newlywed wife Lady Dai: ‘For the sake of all under heaven, will you abandon your life here? I too shall follow you in death afterward…’” “I too shall follow you in death afterward… but when he said this… came her joyful reply: ‘If it’s for your sake…’”

“That’s exceedingly splendid.” “It’s purely Chinese-style.” After that, Wu Qingxiu secretly hired carpenters and plasterers to build a painting studio in the mountains several dozen ri from the imperial capital of Chang’an. “In other words, an atelier.” However, its structure proved highly unconventional—windows positioned high to prevent outside observation, a central bed draped in white cloth installed at its core, with every provision made for fuel, charcoal, vegetables, meat, cold-weather protection and insect-proofing until their siege preparations stood complete. Then he quietly relocated there with Lady Dai. On some day in November of that year, the couple reaffirmed their vow to reunite in the netherworld. After exchanging a farewell cup amidst sorrowful tears, Lady Dai underwent ritual purification and ablutions before adorning herself anew. Swathed in white robes amidst coiling incense smoke as she lay upon the bed, Wu Qingxiu straddled her form and strangled her. Then Wu Qingxiu—having stripped the corpse bare and arranged its limbs with care, scattered fragrant blossoms and burned sacred talismans to exorcise corpse demons—unfurled paper across his workspace. Mixing mineral pigments with meticulous care, he began pouring his life’s essence into creating a polychrome portrait.

“Whoa… That turned into something horrific, didn’t it.” “It’s a far cry from the origin story we heard earlier.” “...Wu Qingxiu was said to have planned this: by depicting his wife’s form—changing every ten days—in approximately twenty sheets of this Illustrated Scroll until she became bare bones, then presenting it to Emperor Xuanzong, he would use his true-to-life brushwork to horrify the emperor by laying bare before his eyes the frailty of human flesh and life’s impermanence.” “However, since this was an era without preservatives or the like—though it was winter—the decay progressed increasingly quickly, so that the appearance at the start and finish of painting a single image became completely different.” “Before he could even finish half of what he’d planned to depict, the corpse had been reduced to nothing but bones and hair… or so it goes. ……Perhaps because scientific knowledge was rudimentary at the time, he had based his plans on the decomposition rate of buried corpses…… In any case, what terrifying perseverance he had.”

“Could it be because it was too cold, so they lit a fire to warm the room?” “Ah… Right.” “A heating system—I’d carelessly overlooked that.” “At subzero temperatures, the paintbrush would freeze... One can only imagine Wu Qingxiu’s panic and horror—so single-mindedly devoted to loyalty yet never anticipating such a miscalculation.” “Having sacrificed his newlywed wife for this desperate enterprise, only to watch it crumble into failure... His wailing knew no bounds—utterly justified... Until at last he resolved: ‘For heaven’s sake, I shall transcend ethical norms this once.’” “What else could he do but act in reckless, desperate frenzy?” “He would venture into nearby villages—whenever he found a beautiful woman, he’d sidle up with false familiarity, pretending ‘I’ll paint your portrait,’ then lure her into the mountains and scheme to beat her dead for a model, but...”

“Whoa… That’s an extremely dangerous brand of loyalty and patriotism, isn’t it.”

“Yeah. Such obsessive tenacity isn’t found among Japanese people. But regardless of what one might say, Wu Qingxiu’s appearance in such a state was truly extraordinary.” His cheeks were sunken, his nose protruded sharply, and his eyes were said to resemble those of a dragon or demon. Moreover, with his matted hair and grimy clothes, he had become so emaciated and wretched that it was unbearable. The women whose sleeves he grabbed all screamed in shock and fled in all directions. He repeated this act for months on end. As his footprints reached far and wide, his notoriety gradually grew—in every village they discovered him, they would immediately chase him away. Fortunately, since no one knew of his mountain hideout, he barely managed to preserve his life. However, Wu Qingxiu’s loyal resolve never wavered; encountering extreme hardships only made it grow more resolute. “In the end, it is written that he came to be known as the Lust Immortal.” “The term ‘Lust Immortal’ seems to mean the Western Bluebeard, in other words.”

“Huh… But the Lust Immortal is pitiable, isn’t he.” “However, this Lust Immortal remained utterly unfazed. This time he changed tactics—seeking out newly buried women, exploiting night’s cover to exhume graves and drag corpses into the mountains. Yet as the saying goes, moving a corpse demands three men’s strength; a limp cadaver lacking weight distribution proved excruciatingly difficult to carry. Though straining with every fiber of his paintbrush-softened arms to transport it undamaged, this proved no ordinary ordeal. Dropping it here, hefting it there—gasping and staggering onward—until dawn broke and villagers spotted him. ‘The Lust Immortal!’ they cried upon witnessing this spectacle. ‘Necrophilia incarnate!’ Declaring him an archfiend, they came clamoring after him until he abandoned the corpse and hid in the mountains. Though spring had arrived, for days afterward he couldn’t shake the corpse’s icy imprint on his back—no fire could stop his chattering teeth.”

“It’s remarkable he didn’t fall ill.” “Yeah. He might have caught a cold or something. The physical strength of someone driven to desperation manifests supernatural resistance.” Moreover, it is written that Wu Qingxiu’s loyal resolve burned fiercer than ice and snow. After remaining sequestered in his painting studio for four or five days and regaining his composure, Wu Qingxiu once again attempted a second venture. Stealthily descending the mountain, he went down to a village in a completely different direction from before, stole a single hoe, and crept toward the only shaded graveyard in the area. There, unexpectedly, he saw a woman offering flowers before an earthen mound illuminated by the new moon’s light. Finding this late-night occurrence strange, he stealthily approached. The woman in question—appearing to be a courtesan who had fled from a distant brothel, her spring attire disheveled—lay prostrated atop an earthen mound. Observing her tearfully imploring, “Why did you abandon me and die?” she presented the very image of one lamenting the death of a beloved man. Wu Qingxiu—consumed by loyalty—observed this heartrending sorrow and was indeed moved to pity, yet forcibly hardened his heart. Sneaking up behind the woman, he shattered the girl’s skull with a single blow from the hoe he carried, bound her limbs with prepared rope, hoisted her onto his back, discarded the hoe, and attempted to flee. Suddenly from the forest behind him came the sound of people—several rough-looking men who appeared to be the woman’s pursuers emerged while shouting in unison: “The rogue is the Lust Immortal!”, “Murderer!”, “Corpse-snatching demon!”, surrounding him from all sides and attempting to seize him. Enraged at this sight, Wu Qingxiu discarded the corpse and roared, “You dare obstruct my divine mission?!” With a hundredfold of maddened strength, he beat down two or three men who had grappled him onto the graveyard soil, then seized the hoe to strike down the remaining assailants and scatter them away. Seizing this opening, he hoisted the courtesan’s corpse onto his shoulder once more and fled pounding away toward the mountains. Remarkably, he finally reached his painting studio along the mountain path, where he purified the carried corpse, laid it upon the bed as a replacement for Lady Dai’s remains, offered incense and flowers, and—while exorcising corpse demons—calmly lit a fire to await its putrefaction. However, after another two or three days had passed, smoke and flames unexpectedly closed in from all directions around the painting studio as a thunderous roar surged forth. Startled by the commotion, he leaned his head out the window to look and saw firewood stacked like mountains encircling the studio, beyond which villagers and officials swarmed like clouds, rallying their forces. “In other words, someone had stealthily tracked Wu Qingxiu’s trail and discovered the painting studio, which led to this large mobilization of people launching a fire attack to flush him out.” At that moment, Wu Qingxiu took with him one volume of this unfinished illustrated scroll; a luminous pearl bestowed by the Consort that had been found within Lady Dai’s hair—a diamond, you see—along with several other items such as a blue langgan gem and a crystal tube. He barely escaped with his life into the mountain forests. Then evading capture while enduring countless hardships over several months, he finally arrived in the capital on some day in November of the following year and staggered through the gate of his own home. In a dreamlike state having already transcended life and death, there was nothing left to seek in ecstasy. “He himself didn’t understand why he had returned, it is said.”

“Haah... That’s truly pitiable.” “That’s truly pitiable.” “That whole situation…” “Hmm. “Just like a living will-o’-the-wisp.” When he entered the gate, the north wind lamented through withered branches and cast them into the frigid garden; pillars leaned askew and tiles fell, scattering fireflies—a scene of utter desolation. Wu Qingxiu forced his way through this chaos and reached his room, but having arrived, found himself at a complete loss. Not a trace of his wife remained—not even a crow’s shadow stirred. No dead leaves lay scattered beneath brocade curtains. The coral-inlaid pillow gave no reply to his calls. Torrential tears overwhelming him as myriad emotions surged forth for the first time, Wu Qingxiu could not even muster sorrowful weeping. He took the cord from a standing screen and hung it across the transom, preparing to hang himself while clutching his wife’s memento—when suddenly, from the adjacent room he’d thought empty came rushing a vision of loveliness clad in crimson... “Ah! You!” she cried, throwing herself upon him.

“Huh——.” “Who on earth is that…?” “When he looked closely, it was none other than Lady Dai—whom he himself had strangled with his own hands, reduced to bones, and disposed of—now adorned in the exquisitely lavish attire of her newlywed days.”

“Well, well… Didn’t he kill Lady Dai?”

“Now be quiet and listen. This part is the most interesting... There, Wu Qingxiu was utterly flabbergasted. With a groan, his vision blurred and he collapsed, but after being nursed back by Lady Dai’s ghost and finally regaining his breath, when he calmed himself and looked again properly, he was astonished once more. Just moments ago, Lady Dai had been wearing the crimson robes of her newlywed days, but now she had rejuvenated into another form from her past—the lovely figure of her palace maid days—trailing a long white robe behind her. Her coiffure was like clouds; she resembled a pure, fresh flower. She appeared to be nothing but an innocent girl of barely sixteen or seventeen years.”

“……How strange. Could such a thing really be possible?”

“Yeah. Wu Qingxiu apparently shared your sentiment.” He nearly collapsed again, but gradually regained his composure through tremendous effort. “How did you come to be here...?” he murmured while lifting her up, examining the girl meticulously from the crown of her head down to her fingernails. To his astonishment—it was Miss Fenko, Lady Dai’s twin sister.

“What?!” *So that’s how it was.* “Yet how fascinating.” “It’s like a play…”

“It’s thoroughly Chinese in style.” As Wu Qingxiu finally began grasping the situation—still having released Miss Fenko while standing dumbfounded—Miss Fenko, now supporting herself against his knees with both hands and flushing crimson, began her account: “I have truly committed an inexcusable deed…” “It must have been an utterly shocking incident.” “What could I possibly conceal?” “I have been living in this house all alone for so long, wearing the clothes my sister left behind, fully impersonating her while pretending to serve you daily as Brother-in-law.” “…My master Wu Qingxiu had been spreading word that he was secluded in his room daily creating a grand masterpiece. He meticulously purchased enough provisions for two each day and occasionally procured paints and brushes to maintain appearances. Thus all the neighbors…amidst this great turmoil, to paint so serenely—what an extraordinary man!…gaped in admiration.” “…I struggled so desperately to maintain your household in absence, waiting day after day for your return throughout this past year. Yet even today—just moments ago—when I returned from shopping, I heard noises in this chamber.” “Moreover—hearing what seemed like loud weeping made me peek inside—only to find you attempting suicide! In that instant I seized you as I was.” While tending your unconscious form, a tightly wrapped bundle resembling a scroll tumbled from your loosened robes alongside my sister’s cherished jewels and hairpins.” “Then you—still half-dreaming—while mimicking worship…‘Dai…’” “‘Forgive me.’” “‘I won’t kill you alone…’ you wept deliriously—so I finally understood my sister had perished by your hand…that you mistook me for her ghost…To dispel your confusion, I hastily changed into my plainest robe.” “But…why ever did you kill Lady Dai?” “Where have you been these twelve long months until today…?” she implored tearfully.

"Ah... But really... Before that—why on earth would that sister Fenko perform such a bizarre act? Wearing her sister's kimono and pretending to serve her husband or whatnot." "Hmm, hmm… That question is quite reasonable. It seems Wu Qingxiu must have felt the same way. Or perhaps his gaping mouth simply remained agape—but in any case, no answer came forth." Still staring down at Miss Fenko’s face in a dumbfounded trance, he remained motionless—until eventually Miss Fenko wiped her tears and, nodding repeatedly, spoke again: “You are absolutely correct.” “Since what I’ve told you so far may not fully clear your doubts, let me explain in proper order… The story goes back to the very end of last year. Ever since my sister left palace service, my loneliness and anxiety—with no relatives or connections outside—only grew worse with each passing day.” "Then again, exactly this month last year—and on this very day—when I heard that my dear Brother-in-law and his wife had suddenly vanished without a trace—without even a word to me of all people—how great was my shock and sorrow!" “All night long, I alternated between thinking and crying until dawn. Overwhelmed by my thoughts, the very next day—having received temporary leave from Lady Yang Guifei—I came to this house intending to search for you both.” After dismissing the two eunuchs who had escorted me and the cleaner watching the house, I investigated the household alone—whereupon I discovered my sister had left home resolved to die. She had stored away the precious ornamental comb from her wedding—snapped in two and wrapped in white paper—in her vanity’s depths. "But as for Brother-in-law, there was no such sign—he seemed to have taken all his painting tools... Thinking there must be some profound reason, I resolved to settle here. From then on, as mentioned earlier, I completely transformed into my sister, making it appear Brother-in-law had returned with her." "Fortunately, since childhood, whenever Brother-in-law began painting, he would shut himself away for days on end and never receive visitors." “I had heard he often neglected meals—proving convenient for deceiving neighbors.” "However, if you ask why I engaged in such strange behavior—it was because remaining here seemed the most practical way to search for you both." “Should anyone spot you two—such a renowned couple—elsewhere, suspicion would immediately fall on me." "If that happened, your whereabouts would become known—then I could follow." “A lone woman searching aimlessly through foreign lands would find nothing… That’s why I devised this plan.”

“Well… That sister is quite the sleuth, isn’t she?” “Hmm… This younger sister here—unlike her elder—seems to possess a somewhat chivalrous bent,” she continued, “yet even so… my stratagems proved rather ineffectual.” “...For no sooner had ten days passed since my arrival at this house than the realm was suddenly thrown into turmoil—armed men filled every street and alleyway, rendering venturing outdoors utterly impossible.” “Not only that, but funds ran dry.” “The house fell to ruin.” “With no alternative, I took up residence in the kitchen of this dwelling, selling off not only my personal effects but also Brother-in-law and his wife’s furnishings and garments to sustain myself—though among these, what I preserved until the very end were a single crimson robe from my sister’s hasty newlywed days and one set of palace maid’s attire I myself had worn.” “Of these, again, this crimson garment served as outerwear solely to compel others to recognize me as my sister.” “As for the palace maid’s garb—kept stored away with my most cherished memories—being of Yang Guifei-era fashion, I used it unchanged for sleepwear, lest careless display invite suspicion from rebel-hunting underlings.” “Throughout this long year I have labored thus while awaiting your return… Yet why in heaven’s name did you slay my sister?” “And for what purpose did you return to this house?” “What became of your former aspect?” “If you’ve already killed Sister, then dispatch me too while you’re at it…” she wailed mid-sentence.

“She’s quite the devoted younger sister, isn’t she?” “Oh, come on! I’ve been making moves on Wu Qingxiu all along.”

“Oh?… How do you know?” “Why? Your very demeanor was suspicious in the first place! For an unmarried woman like myself to playact being the mistress and remain sequestered in this dreadful ruin for nearly a year—such conduct couldn’t possibly stem from mere obligation or curiosity! There must have been some secret hope or pleasure sustaining me... Moreover, parading about in my sister’s crimson bridal robe from her hasty newlywed days—by any measure, doesn’t that reek of quintessentially Chinese-style bold perversion? Or perhaps I absorbed this tendency from the countless palace maids weeping in empty chambers during Emperor Xuanzong’s reign—”

"But... she herself doesn't think so, does she?" "Of course not—she's not yet of an age to possess such capacity for self-reflection." "Especially being female—they can effortlessly construct any delicate rationale and indulge in willful self-absorption. That's how it works." "The perverse psychology of pure-hearted, intelligent people is remarkably difficult to discern... But once my eyes grow sufficiently keen, I can detect all manner of deviant psychologies even in innocent infants—or in Buddha, Confucius, or Christ."

“Wow... I’m shocked.” “So that’s how it is…” “Now, there are still more shocking details hidden beneath what I’ve told you so far—I’ll explain those later—but let me cut this long story short: When Miss Fenko pressed Wu Qingxiu and exhaustively questioned him about everything that had transpired, then unrolled before him as concrete evidence the illustrated scroll depicting her sister’s death portrait—which perfectly resembled her own features—she endured truly heart-wrenching grief, trembling limbs, and prolonged horror. Yet in the end, utterly moved by her brother-in-law and his wife’s display of loyalty and valor, she wailed and lamented: ‘O heavens, O heavens! Why are you so heartless?’ ‘You may not be aware, but last November when you began sketching your sister’s corpse was the very month An Lushan raised his rebellion. The Tianbao era ended with that year—we now live in the first year of Zhide under An Lushan’s reign.’ ‘His Majesty the Emperor and Lady Yang Guifei both met their end, killed at Mawei this June.’ ‘All your hard-earned loyalty has come to naught.’ ‘Rather than that, won’t you flee somewhere with me...?’ she pressed urgently.”

“What a reckless woman.” “Thinking you’d be killed again…”

“No. “This time it’s safe.” “That is because Mr. Wu Qingxiu—it was only through Fenko’s explanation that he first came to understand how the work into which he had thrown his entire being had been a complete failure from start to finish.” So like Columbus who had lost America, he plopped down right there and fell into a dumbfounded Anpontan-like trance, becoming permanently unable to speak. “In old-fashioned technical terms, it’s what you’d call an autogenous disorder arising from sudden psychological upheaval.” When she saw this, Miss Fenko felt increasingly sorry for him—glared at the heavens and cursed An Lushan’s treachery. “…and simultaneously confessed she had resolved with crystalline clarity to devote her life to protecting this loyal minister while praying for the souls of Emperor Xuanzong and Yang Guifei—but in truth, this was full-throttle infatuation.”

“No way…” “No. “That must be it. I'll explain this later... So Wu Qingxiu sold off the jewels and other mementos of his sister that he had been carrying in his robe, keeping only the portrait tucked against his chest. While leading the ghostly Wu Qingxiu by the hand, we wandered from place to place until toward year's end—though I forgot where we had intended to go—we boarded a boat, sailed down the river, and drifted out to sea.” Then, after several days of violent storms, only the two of them survived and drifted on the open sea for another ten-odd days, until finally arriving at a clear dawn when they spotted a grand ship splendidly outfitted on the eastern horizon, its banners glittering in the morning sun as it sailed southward. There, on the verge of collapse, gasping for breath, they waved for help and were rescued. Aboard that splendid ship, they received devoted care—and this vessel was none other than that of the Bohai emissary en route from Karatsu, Japan, to Naniwa Port. “Bohai Kingdom was an independent state located around what is now Jilin in Manchuria at that time, and it’s recorded in official histories that they occasionally brought tribute to Japan like this, you know.”

“It’s become something like a fairy tale, hasn’t it?”

“Hmm.” “There’s something dreamlike about it that’s still distinctly Chinese in style.” Then, those aboard the ship who had heard the detailed circumstances through Miss Fenko’s tearful story—beginning with the Bohai emissary—all expressed full-hearted sympathy. They all uniformly pitied Wu Qingxiu’s lifeless figure and sympathized with Lady Fen’s circumstances, deciding to take them to Japan while providing devoted care. But during this journey, when everyone aboard was asleep on a midnight when the moon shone clear as ice, Wu Qingxiu disappeared from the ship at twenty-eight years of age—whether he fell into the sea or ascended to heaven remains unknown…… Lady Fen, then nineteen, frantically struggled to follow after him. However, as she already carried Wu Qingxiu’s child and was nearing her due date at this time, she was barely persuaded to desist while being restrained by others. Soon after, she gave birth to a jewel-like boy aboard the ship.

“Things finally seem to be looking up.” “Indeed—just when those aboard were feeling downcast over a death on the ship, news of a childbirth arrived. They couldn’t help but rejoice, each personally presenting congratulatory gifts while celebrating the auspicious occasion. Then a scholar from the Bohai emissary became the naming parent, bestowing the name Wu Zhongxiong. After conducting an extravagant naming ceremony to bless his future, they had them disembark at Karatsu and entrusted them to a local magnate—a certain Matsura. There, Lady Fen recorded these origins in this illustrated scroll to pass down to her descendants... and they all lived happily ever after.”

“So that eloquent text was written by Lady Fen, then?”

“No. “The characters are indeed in a woman’s hand, but the composition itself is far too robust to have been written by a woman. When one observes how the text adheres to rhyme in various places, with its use of compound words and other elements that seem uncharacteristic of Japanese, I believe the Bohai emissary who served as naming parent—moved by Lady Fen’s tale—likely drafted the text during their idle hours aboard the ship, which Lady Fen then transcribed. Wakabayashi claims that since the calligraphic style resembles characters carved beneath the Maitreya statue, Monk Shōkū likely fabricated this text by cross-referencing stories he himself heard with ancient documents—but handwritten and carved characters often differ significantly in style, making this theory unreliable.”

"In any case, it must have caused quite a sensation in Karatsu Port... Lady Fen's circumstances..." "Of course, it likely drew immense public sympathy." "After all, it embodies precisely the sort of tale celebrating loyalty, courage, righteousness, and martyrdom that Japanese people so adore." "That’s true… Oh, and I just recalled—after that monk Shōkū enshrined the illustrated scroll within the Maitreya statue, he supposedly declared that no men should approach it. What was the reason for that?"

“Th-that... that very spot... that’s precisely what makes this tale so fascinating—the focal point that ultimately connects to the fundamental problem behind the Neba Beach incident in the present Taisho era.” “To put it plainly—Reverend Shōkū knew full well about the existence of psychological heredity nearly a thousand years ago.” “Whoa... So the study of psychological heredity existed that far back...” “It wasn’t just that it existed—it was so overwhelmingly present it became a problem." "It existed in such overwhelming abundance that it became a problem." "...in other words, all the detritus in the universe has evolved from plants to animals to humans while each struggles against their own arbitrary psychological heredity, and those bound by it are inferior beings with the least freedom." "So now’s the time to boldly and completely break free from psychological heredity." "The declaration urging people to become truly liberated beings under an open sky was hammered into the masses in its raw, nascent form by Christ; wrapped in oblate and tossed out by Confucius; and baked into delicious confections, gaudily decorated, then hyped up with bells and drums like patent medicine by Buddha—that’s how it goes." "So there you have it—I, who stand before you now, have pilfered only the most lucrative aspects of those charlatans’ patented tricks, repackaged them under the fashionable label of ‘psychological heredity,’ and launched a grand campaign to extract a hundred percent surplus value… Ha ha ha… Well, never mind all that. As for Monk Shōkū’s name—it does seem Tendai sect in origin—he likely grasped this logic through reading something like the Lotus Sutra…”

When one looked at this illustrated scroll, with just a single glance, the causal connections and karmic ties of the three temporal states—past, present, and future—became clear to such a degree. At the same time as Wu Qingxiu’s descendants looked upon this, their hereditary psychology was stimulated, making it only natural they began imitating their ancestors. “Hmm, hmm...” Monk Shōkū must have thought it an exceedingly pitiful affair. He carved a statue of Maitreya Bodhisattva—said to appear at the world’s final hour—sealed it inside, and strictly prohibited it with the injunction: “No men may look upon this.” ...Yet when told they must not look, the more they yearned to look—such has been human nature since the days of Adachigahara—and so from among Wu Qingxiu’s descendants emerged someone who stealthily pulled off Maitreya-sama’s head to retrieve and view the scroll. The reason they all went mad and ran amok was because of this, but then came Kotei’s Midoriya Tsubotarou of the Kure family… This man, through the power of Zen studies or some such, discerned the workings of psychological heredity and resolved to burn the scroll once and for all. Whether... or not remains unknown—he likely had regrets... Pretending to burn it on the surface while in truth not burning it at all, they returned it to its original cavity and muddied the waters by holding an elaborate memorial service for the scroll. “And so this illustrated scroll made a grand entrance into the modern materialistic world and triggered a terrifying tragedy... That’s the general outline of events, you see...”

“Ah... I finally understand... But why is it that only men go insane upon seeing that illustrated scroll?” “Hmm... Brilliant.” “You’re brilliant… That’s a splendid question…”

As he spoke, Dr. Masaki suddenly slapped the table with his open hand, startling me into straightening up. Without quite understanding why, my heart thudded in my chest... However, Dr. Masaki continued speaking without concerning himself with any details.

“Impressive, impressive. The true climax of this case’s intrigue lies precisely there. He’s become a complete master of psychological heredity now. You...” “How...?” “What do you mean ‘how’? Just open this illustrated scroll and look. All your current doubts will resolve themselves in an instant… Though mind you—if you truly are Kure Ichirou, you might either begin meandering through psychogenetic somnambulism as Wu Qingxiu’s descendant… or recover in one stroke all memories of who you are—what place you hail from, what history binds you to this case… Or perhaps you’ll suddenly recall—with a flash—the crux of this affair: ‘When and where did someone show me this scroll before? Who was it?’… Whether Wakabayashi or I will win or lose… And finally, under what karmic bonds you’ll inevitably have to build a sweet home with that beautiful young lady… All these suffocatingly grave questions might resolve themselves the moment you look upon this scroll. Ha ha ha ha!”

After saying this in one breath, Dr. Masaki bared a mouthful of white false teeth and laughed heartily. With one hand, he pulled the newspaper-wrapped package before his eyes toward himself and carelessly tore it open with a rustle, revealing a rectangular plain wood box inside. This time opening the lid with meticulous care, he took out a navy blue cotton-wrapped bundle about three inches in diameter and six inches in length, placed one end on the box's edge, then gently set the lid back on top while pushing the whole arrangement toward me.

All my nerves, which had been somewhat relaxed until now, rapidly grew taut all at once amidst the undulating waves of Dr. Masaki’s booming laughter.

...Was he mocking me...? Threatening me...? Or planting some suggestion...? Or maybe just... cracking jokes...? As I stared at that unreadable smiling face—utterly inscrutable—I found myself once more unable to suppress the growing conviction that its owner appeared before me as nothing less than a dread sorcerer of unparalleled terror, a being who should rightly inspire universal fear and trembling. But at the same time...

...What nonsense... The idea that a single man could be driven mad through mere manipulation by some ordinary illustrated scroll—such a thing couldn't possibly exist... No matter how masterfully crafted or terrifying those images might be, they're ultimately nothing more than combinations of color and line. Especially since I was mentally prepared here—what could possibly frighten me... Come on... I couldn't suppress the rebellious feelings rapidly swelling up within me.

...Therefore, I pulled the box closer with as much composure as I could muster. Then, opening the wooden lid and navy blue cotton cloth, I strained to suppress the tension that was once again beginning to rise within me as I first examined the exterior of the illustrated scroll. The scroll’s spindle was a beautiful green stone polished into an octagonal shape, its beauty so striking that I found myself unconsciously running my fingers over it. At first glance, the mounting fabric appeared woven, but upon closer inspection revealed itself as an expanse of colored and gold-silver threads so fine they verged on invisibility—these delicate strands tracing the weave of gossamer silk while densely embroidered with a procession of Chinese lions, each about an inch in size and rendered in shifting hues without gaps between them. The profound preciousness of this work gradually permeated my awareness. Despite being said to be nearly a thousand years old, its gleaming, pristine appearance must have been due to having been stored with utmost care. In one corner was affixed a small rectangular piece of gold paper, but there was no trace of any writing.

“That’s the notorious stitch-over embroidery we’ve been talking about.” “Chiyoko—Kure Ichirou’s mother—must have used that as her reference piece while studying.”

With that offhand explanation, Dr. Masaki turned sharply sideways and began puffing on his cigar. However, I had been entertaining similar associations in my mind and nodded without particular surprise. Untying the dark brown cord fastened with an ivory tool and slightly opening the scroll, I saw water depicted in gold pigment on purple-black paper - ripples flowing from upper right to lower left in an exceptionally elegant brush style. Entranced by beautiful swirls of soft golden lines emerging from the bluish-dark surface - resembling either dreams or wispy smoke - I continued unrolling the scroll from right to left without conscious thought... until about five inches of white paper abruptly appeared before my eyes, when I involuntarily...

"Ah..." I started to cry out— But that sound—before it could form into a proper cry—was swallowed back into the depths of my throat in the very next instant. ......I had spread the scroll open with both hands and found myself unable to move. My chest palpitations grew so intense it became hard to breathe...

The sleeping face of a nude woman lying there... slender eyebrows... long eyelashes... a refined white nose... small vermilion lips... pure cheeks... Was this not the very image of that mad beauty from Room Six in her slumber?... The massive black tresses arranged in large petal-like shapes lay densely layered like stormclouds... From the styling of her sidelocks down to the faint disarray at her hairline—every detail appeared an exact replica of that girl from Room Six's sleeping form………….

But at that moment, I had no room to entertain questions of "why." That sleeping face... no, from beneath the expression that seemed merely asleep, the beauty of a corpse's features—revealed through subtle coloration and linework—emerged with an indescribable depth of allure. My entire soul was drawn in and consumed, to the point where I felt those eyes might at any moment snap open...and my entire nervous system remained assailed by an impossible premonition—that she might let out an "Ah... Big Brother!" like before and come leaping at me... Unable to blink even once or swallow a mouthful of saliva, I remained staring from those carmine-tinged, faintly blurred cheeks down to the bluish-glowing coral-colored lips.

“Ha ha ha.” “You’ve gone completely rigid, haven’t you?” “Hey... you there.” “How’s that?” “It’s something else, isn’t it?” “Wu Qingxiu’s brushwork is…”

From beyond the illustrated scroll, Dr. Masaki called out in this casual manner. However, I still could not move. I could only just manage to speak in broken fragments. In a strange, raspy voice entirely unlike before... "...This face... it's the same as... Kure Moyoko's..." “It’s a spitting image, isn’t it...”

“It’s a spitting image, isn’t it...” Dr. Masaki immediately resumed and said.

At that moment, I finally managed to tear my eyes away from the scroll and look at Dr. Masaki’s face turned toward me—but spread across his face was a smile indefinable as either sympathy, pride, or irony. “……Isn’t this fascinating…? “Just as psychological heredity is terrifying, so too is physical heredity a dreadful thing. "The fact that some farm girl from Meganohama—Kure Moyoko—could bear the perfect likeness to the Twin Butterfly Sisters of Huāqīng Palace who caused such a sensation over a thousand years ago during Emperor Xuanzong’s reign... why, even the Creator Deity Himself must have forgotten He’d crafted such duplicates!"

…… “They say history repeats itself, but human bodies and minds also progress through such repetitions.” “Though this case represents an exceptionally tailored specimen among such phenomena... When observing Kure Moyoko somnambulistically reenacting Lady Fen’s psychology while simultaneously reproducing her elder sister Lady Dai’s mentality—she who apparently took pleasure in being strangled by her husband Wu Qingxiu—it suggests their ancestral line contained women with such perfected masochism that these two have now manifested that bloodline’s essence.” “There are also passages indicating Lady Fen’s passion for Wu Qingxiu had reached such intensity that she came to envy her elder sister’s fate of dying at her beloved’s hands.” “But even without plumbing those depths, anyone could see how this single scroll lays bare the ultimate expression of marital devotion between Wu Qingxiu and the Dai-Fen sisters... Just keep unrolling it to the end.” “The true nature of Kure Ichirou’s psychological heredity will be laid utterly bare…”

As if propelled by these words, I continued unrolling the scroll leftward in a half-conscious state. To describe without exaggeration beyond their vivid realism the intricately colored paintings that sequentially emerged on the blank paper: there lay a nude figure of what seemed to be a Dead Beauty measuring approximately one shaku two or three sun in length, positioned head to the right with both hands placed palm-down at her sides, diagonally oriented toward the viewer. The surrounding blankness created an illusion of the figure floating in void. These six figures stood spaced three or four sun apart in succession, all sharing nearly identical reclining postures yet transforming progressively in appearance from first to last.

The first painting at the scroll’s beginning that appeared and startled me depicted snow-white skin suggesting recent death, with rouge-red hues alluringly suffusing the cheeks and ears. As I stared at those gently closed eyes with their long lids and thick lashes, at those bluish-glowing lips lightly sealed with rouge—at this tender visage—the divine joy of one who died for her husband seemed to radiate forth in its entirety. Yet in the second painting, the skin color shifted to a slightly reddish-purple hue, with the entire figure appearing somewhat swollen. Dark shadows lingered around the rims of the eyes, while the lips took on a faint blackish tinge—the whole impression transformed into something oppressively heavy and sinister.

In the subsequent third image, areas across the face - the forehead, behind the ears, and patches of abdominal skin - had already begun festering red and white. The eyes glistened dully open, white teeth becoming partially visible as the entire figure transformed into a solemn dark purple hue, its belly swollen taut like a drum and gleaming. The fourth painting showed the entire body sunk into a profound color best described as bluish-black, the festered areas mottled with brownish-black and eggshell white. Breasts slid downward to expose bluish-white ribs while the abdomen split open near the pelvic bone, revealing cobalt-hued viscera overlapping within. The face - with fully exposed eyeballs and lips sloughed away to bare clenched white teeth - not only bore a demon-like expression, but from the slimy, matted hair that had fallen out scattered beautiful combs and jeweled ornaments in disarray.

In the fifth stage, progressing yet another step, the eyeballs had collapsed and shriveled, with all teeth exposed up to the base of the ears, creating an expression resembling a cold sneer. Meanwhile, the organs together with the abdominal skin had blackened, shriveled, and flattened completely like tattered rags, while the ribs and limb bones stood starkly exposed in pallid whiteness - only the pubic bone, matted with hair, protruded prominently, making even gender distinction impossible. In the final sixth image, only a bluish-brown skeleton remained, with black flesh clumped like seaweed clinging to it—transformed into something resembling a shipwrecked derelict. The head, indistinguishable between monkey and human, tilted completely toward this direction, yet only the teeth remained white, gaping open and stuck fast.

……I cannot record lies. Looking back now, it was utterly shameful, but I found myself viewing them increasingly hastily as I neared the end.

Of course, when I first began unrolling this illustrated scroll, I maintained a composed attitude tinged with defiant resolve. But no sooner had the Dead Beauty's image appeared than those feelings vanished without a trace. Though fully aware that my hands were moving ever faster through the scroll's progression, I found myself utterly unable to restrain their motion. Even so, desperately holding my breath lest Dr. Masaki before me should laugh, I believed I had scrutinized them as meticulously as possible—yet in the end I could no longer endure it, and might as well say I simply let that sixth image flash before my eyes. Enveloped in the bottomless demonic aura emanating from the painting and the unbearable stench searing my nerves—nearly suffocating under their weight—I finally reached where the start of the origin account near the scroll's end became visible, and before I knew it, I came to my senses with a gasp of relief. Then, I merely skimmed over the densely written Classical Chinese text spanning four or five shaku in length and reached the conclusion at its end,

Great Yamato Court Tenpyō Hōji 3rd Year, Kigai May, at Nishikai Hinokuni Matsura-gata Hōmasekii Station 大唐翰林学士芳九連二女芬　識 After reading those characters two or three times and somewhat calming my nerves, I rolled it back up as it had been and placed it beside the box. Then, to calm my nerves, I leaned back in the chair, pressed both hands tightly against my face, and closed my eyes.

“...Well? Shocked, weren’t you. Hahahaha. Even after depicting all this, he still felt it insufficient—can you grasp Wu Qingxiu’s psychology?” …… “By common sense standards, those six Dead Beauty images should’ve been more than enough to astonish the Emperor. Most people would collapse after seeing just half of them. Moreover, Wu Qingxiu’s continued pursuit of fresh female corpses proves he’d degenerated into pathological psychology. His mind grew aberrant after being gnawed at by the decay images of Dead Beauties he himself painted. Can you comprehend that psychology...?”

While these words vibrated against my eardrums, I kept my eyes tightly shut and my hands pressed firmly against them—within the faint reddish darkness behind my eyelids, the first Dead Beauty painting I had just witnessed materialized faintly veiled in white light. Before any thought could form, the second and third images began gliding left to right in sequence, but upon reaching the fifth—depicting fifty days post-mortem with its pallid tea-stained grinning visage—everything came to an abrupt halt before my eyes.

I involuntarily shuddered. When I snapped my eyes open, I found Dr. Masaki had swiveled his chair to face me head-on with arms crossed, our gazes locking... Instantly, the professor flashed his dentures through darkened lips in a tight smile while sharply lifting the thin red ears framing his face, making me shudder again involuntarily and lower my eyes.

“Hmmhmhmhmhm. “That sent a chill through you.” “Hmmhmhmhmhm… As it should. When Kure Ichirou first saw this too, he must have trembled just like you. Much like how primordial organisms’ remains persist as petroleum in geological strata, that single-minded ancestral will lying hidden in the psychological substratum of Kure Ichirou was ignited the moment he shuddered at this scroll.” “And then—in the blink of an eye—it erupted into a great radiance powerful enough to obliterate all conscious awareness of reality.” “Past, present, future—even the light of sun, moon, and stars was utterly consumed by that brilliance. He kept shuddering until his very psyche became identical to Wu Qingxiu’s… no, until he had fully transformed into Wu Qingxiu himself. When Kure Ichirou stood in the Nie-no-Hama quarry amid crimson sunset light—rolling up this scroll while heaving a sigh to gaze westward—he was already no longer the Kure Ichirou of before.” What remained was merely the vestiges of a certain youth’s memory, judgment, and habitual faculties—every bodily cell now awakened to Wu Qingxiu’s ardent desires… That Kure Ichirou has lived with psychology identical to Wu Qingxiu’s since his descent into madness can be conclusively inferred from how perfectly the psychological transitions recorded in this origin story align with the progression of Kure Ichirou’s psychiatric condition. “No—when we psychopathologically observe the psychological transitions manifested in both their actions, Kure Ichirou is none other than Wu Qingxiu reborn a thousand years later.”

I shuddered with a different kind of dread and readjusted my seating.

“To comprehend this astonishingly bizarre phenomenon, we must first elucidate the psychopathological steps through which Kure Ichirou and Wu Qingxiu exchanged places.” “To put it plainly—how could Kure Ichirou, an honors student yet one who’d never studied Classical Chinese since middle school, have possibly read and understood this origin story? Nearly five-shaku-long, meticulously written in pure unannotated Classical Chinese text—to such a profoundly maddening degree that it drove him insane? This is where our doubts must begin...” “……Well… do you grasp this?” “The reason being—”

I kept staring into Dr. Masaki's eyes glowing from their depths as I forced saliva down my parched throat. I wondered in astonishment why I hadn't noticed this before... "You wouldn't understand... No, you couldn't possibly understand." "The moment you consider that Kure Ichirou read this origin story through his own academic abilities, anyone would find the reasoning incomprehensible."

"Then... someone... had it read to him..." Before I could even finish speaking, I was overcome with horror and began trembling violently. ......Someone......some entity had been nearby......there was someone who had explained things to me just as I'd heard......there was......that person......that person......that one......that one...

As I thought this, the heartbeat that had been racing intensely suddenly stilled once more. And then, at that very moment, I saw Dr. Masaki’s solemn gaze gradually soften. I watched as lips that had been tightly pursed rapidly slackened, transforming into a smile that seemed to pity me... No sooner had I witnessed this than words carelessly flung out flew forth along with cigar smoke.

“...‘When fox-possessed people fall, they revert to their original illiteracy’... Do you know this senryū...”

I was taken aback. Suddenly feeling as though something invisible had struck my cheek, I blinked my eyes rapidly for some time. “I… I’ve never heard of that senryū…” “Hmph—— If you don’t know this verse, you can’t claim to know senryū at all." “A razor-edged masterpiece even among the Yanagidaru collection.”

Having said this, Dr. Masaki hinted at his triumphant expression with the tip of his nose while pulling one knee up onto the chair with a forceful motion. “Th-that… what about it?” “What do you mean ‘what about it’? Unless you grasp this principle of psychological heredity expressed in the senryū, even if some master detective combining Shylock Holmes and Arsène Lupin were to appear, this mystery would remain unsolvable.”

Dr. Masaki coldly declared this, and from his mouth a single small smoke ring welled up swirlingly and disappeared above my head.

I blinked my eyes rapidly again.

……Fox-possessed… when they fall… when they fall… original illiteracy… original illiteracy… I repeated it in my mind, but no matter how much I thought about it, I couldn't understand. “Does Dr. Wakabayashi know... that reasoning...” “I explained it to him. He was quite grateful.” “Huh...? What’s the reason...?” “The reason... Well, it's like this. “Alright...”

Dr. Masaki leisurely leaned against the chairback and stretched his legs out fully. "This senryū perfectly illustrates how fox possession constitutes a psychogenetic episode... Specifically, fox-possessed individuals display bizarre animalistic behaviors during these fits—making strange beast-like gestures, thrusting their faces into rice tubs, crawling under floors to sleep—all while rolling their eyes upward to manifest the primitive animal psychology of ancestors from antiquity. This explains why they're called 'fox-possessed.' Yet simultaneously, such possessed people often exhibit not only these traits but also memories and scholarly abilities inherited from human ancestors several generations removed." "A person who couldn't read a single character becomes fox-possessed and starts reading fluently, displaying various ancestral talents and knowledge—there are endless such astonishing examples, which is precisely why this phenomenon became immortalized in senryū."

“Huh— “Ancestral memories extend to such minute details…” “…That’s precisely why we term it psychological heredity.” “When ignorant peasant farmers become fox-possessed, they compose poetry, craft verses, playact as physicians curing incurable maladies.” “It may appear mystifying at first blush, but through psychogenetic principles, it becomes utterly mundane.” “Perfectly natural… Particularly as this scroll’s visual elements take precedence—while gazing upon them, Kure Ichirou grew thoroughly agitated, nearly wholly assimilating Wu Qingxiu’s psyche.” “In that state, he effortlessly recalled even memories of the origin story’s contents—which his ancestors had read until madness took them—time and again.” “Wu Qingxiu’s erudition as a Fanyang Jinshi became akin to rereading one’s own memorized biography.” “No wonder he could recite it flawlessly from blank paper.”

“……I’m astonished…… I see……” “This became the first-stage suggestion, but next, what served as the second-stage suggestion to plunge Kure Ichirou into stupor was the ideology embedded within those six Dead Beauty images.” “When you speak of ideology... it’s still Wu Qingxiu’s…” “Exactly. The very foundation of this psychological heredity begins with Wu Qingxiu’s loyalty and patriotism, culminating in his suicide—but these are merely the surface-level facts recorded in the origin story. If one delves just one step deeper into the truth beneath those facts, who could have possibly anticipated what lies there? The process by which Wu Qingxiu’s loyalty and valor gradually transformed into purely abnormal sexual desires becomes unmistakably apparent. Just like timber being dry-distilled and changing into alcohol.”

“……………” “...Now, to explain this progression—though it would take far more than a year or two of lectures to fully unpack—I’ll summarize just the skeletal framework of my unpublished draft that I’d intended to append to that psychogenetics treatise burned last night. As mentioned earlier, Wu Qingxiu’s original motivation for undertaking this work appears at first glance as that sacred, peerless ideal—pure sincerity and loyalty toward all living beings under heaven. But this constitutes superficial observation. When inferring and studying subsequent developments through research, we find beneath that peerless sanctity and pure devotion various profound elements of artist-like abnormal psychology—foreign components that even Wu Qingxiu himself remained unaware of harboring.” “Unless one considers this, it becomes utterly impossible to explain the manifold inconsistencies regarding this illustrated scroll’s raison d'être.”

“The significance of this illustrated scroll’s existence…” “Exactly. When one carefully compares and studies the images in this illustrated scroll with the facts recorded in its origin story, the very reason for this scroll’s existence—in its fundamental principles—becomes suspect. In other words… this illustrated scroll could have sufficiently achieved its purpose of admonishing the Emperor simply by arranging these six images. To make one realize how ephemeral a woman’s physical beauty is… how swiftly impermanent… these six decayed beauty images alone would have been ample. Proof speaks louder than theory. Given that even you were chilled to the bone just from glancing through it now, at this very moment…”

“That… is… so… isn’t it…” “Exactly. If one were to add another illustration of a skeleton following that sixth figure resembling dried-up remains, one could say that would make the scroll perfectly complete. Had he written admonitions and accounts of his struggles on the remaining blank space, presented it to the throne, and then taken his own life afterward, it would have been more than enough to turn the resolve of that timid, cultured Emperor inside out. Yet why did he refuse this course? Why persist in seeking unnecessary new sacrifices? Why—when simply waiting patiently for Lady Dai’s remains to fully skeletonize would have allowed him to complete the scroll without hardship—did he leave it unfinished for posterity, transforming it into dreadful psychogenetic material that would curse the Kure family? Why create this chain of cause and effect now prized as academic research material 1,100 years later…?”

I found myself heaving an involuntary sigh. Captivated by the eerie atmosphere welling up from Dr. Masaki’s words, I felt a maddening, inexplicable suspicion gradually swelling within me...

“How about it… Isn’t it mysterious?” “It may seem like a minor issue, but it’s actually an exceedingly significant one.” “Moreover, this problem should only become more unclear the more you think about it...” “Ha ha ha ha ha.” “That’s precisely why I say...” “To solve this problem, we must return to and observe the initial psychological factors that led Wu Qingxiu to conceive creating this illustrated scroll.” “We must dissect Wu Qingxiu’s psychological state at that time and trace back to the very origin from which these contradictions arose... and moreover, this is by no means a difficult problem.”

…………… “That is to say—when we peel away this layer of superficial consciousness called ‘loyalty and patriotism’ enveloping Wu Qingxiu’s psychological elements from that time, what first emerges beneath it is a blazing desire for honor.” “Next comes a scorching artistic desire... Then, in the very depths, passionate love surpassing the boiling point combined with sexual desire—these four thoroughly realized desires fused into one, emitting superhumanly intense heat.” “In the end, it becomes starkly clear that the true nature of Wu Qingxiu’s splendid loyalty and patriotism was nothing more than a remarkably base and profound conglomeration of abnormal sexual desire.”

I involuntarily wiped my nose with a handkerchief. I felt as though my own psychology was being dissected... “To explain this concretely, it would unfold as follows.” “Wu Qingxiu had witnessed how Li Bai gained imperial favor by composing poems flattering Emperor Xuanzong’s decadence—thereby becoming the realm’s greatest poet. Very well.” “In that case, I shall immortalize my name through painting and chronicles by taking the exact opposite approach.” “He resolved to create an unprecedented grotesque painting through his brushwork that would shock all under heaven and posterity... This represents the most heightened desire for honor typical of such young, genius-bent artists.” Moreover, Wu Qingxiu—intoxicated by newlywed bliss from his utterly smitten wife’s complete devotion to both his masculine charm and genius-deserving fame—had within mere months exhausted every form of loving and being loved. “From this point onward, he began feeling nightly a desire so intense that unless he abused his beautiful lover with extreme cruelty, no greater thrill could be sought.” “This indeed embodies the supernatural love—nay, sexual desire—common among genius-bent youths... particularly brilliant artists. And another aspect... The ultimate admiration lies in destruction.” “It resides in coldly observing that grotesque content laid utterly bare... this impasse of artistic desire—alongside these four desires converging into a white-hot focal point within this grand scheme.” Moreover, we must consider that Wu Qingxiu persistently deluded himself into perceiving these intense desires as pure loyalty and sincerity. Yet what lays bare his psychological state’s hidden aspects is precisely these scroll images. “The form of a decaying beauty.”

Before my eyes, the previous Dead Beauty hallucination threatened to reappear once more. Involuntarily rubbing my eyes with both hands, I lowered my gaze to the illustrated scroll before me and fixed my stare on one of the golden Chinese lions gleaming within its mounting. As if willing that apparition not to manifest... "...As Wu Qingxiu painstakingly transcribed the Dead Beauty's decaying forms from one image to the next, he began experiencing an indescribable pleasure." "This becomes evident when observing how his brushwork grows increasingly precise and vivid from the scroll's beginning to end." "That exposed feminine form - epitomizing through color and contour the human body's supreme natural beauty in its transparently refined harmony - gradually dims its radiance bit by bit, transforms into shadowy grotesquerie, and ultimately descends into wretched putrefaction before collapsing into chaotic ghastliness; the infinite variations and transitions of hues and shapes manifesting throughout this process would have constituted a spectacle of wonder nearly defying description." "While beholding this symphony of beauty's demise - savored through countless sensory dimensions - and quietly transcribing it onto paper, his state of mind could never compare to some historian merely chronicling a nation's decline." "Wu Qingxiu - having poured his loyalty, honor, carnal desire, sexual passion, and artistic ambition into this self-obliterating trance - must have committed every nuance of this pleasure and aesthetic sensation to brushwork while relishing them with insatiable intensity." "When he saw those remains had decayed beyond further transformation save skeletalization, he resolutely cast aside his brush and rose." "With his entire soul aquiver under white-hot craving to taste this euphoria anew, he wandered forth." "Moreover... within Wu Qingxiu's psychological depths, sexual desire long compressed through ascetic deprivation must have delivered ceaseless stimulation of excruciating intensity." "That stimulus - exhaustively refracted through nerves both spent and razor-sharp, warping and dissociating even as it persisted - must have sent perverse excitation swirling through his entire being, reaching extremes of acrid acuity." "And I believe those twisted perverse urges and memories beyond description came to saturate every cell in his body with impressions so profound they verged on bursting."

Dr. Masaki’s voice—subdued and somber, yet carrying an ominous intensity—momentarily ceased there.

I kept staring unwaveringly at the lion embroidery before my eyes, its details blurring from visual fatigue. While inexplicably drawn to a single verdant thread emerging from the haze of colors, I continued listening. "...Having transcended loyalty to sovereign, patriotism, honor, art, marital love—everything—Wu Qingxiu existed solely through the stimulation of his intensely abnormal sexual desires. Yet upon returning home after a year's absence, he became ensnared by another perverse desire within those walls—his virgin sister-in-law Miss Fen. When she executed a flawless ippon seoi nage throw on him, that violent stimulus severed his obsession in one decisive stroke." The abnormal sexual desire that had blazed like infernal flames—sustaining his consciousness until the final moment—vanished with its fuel, leaving him a dementia-ridden shell in Karan-dō. Thus he died, bequeathing to posterity his lineage containing all those perversely twisted sexual desires conditioned through long years of warping—every terrifying memory entwined within this vessel... This lineage persisted through endless cycles of death and rebirth until reaching Kure Ichirou, where it once more seized its chance to awaken with shocking force. The psychological heredity lurking in the deepest consciousness of every cell in Kure Ichirou's body... The abnormal sexual desires and related memories repeatedly savored through generations from ancestor Wu Qingxiu downward—these were vividly awakened by those six Dead Beauty images... Meaning that after viewing this scroll, Kure Ichirou became Wu Qingxiu clad in Kure Ichirou's form. The desires and memories of Wu Qingxiu from a millennium past overlapped with Kure Ichirou's present consciousness and activated... This constituted Kure Ichirou's very existence following his somnambulism. "The only scientific condition capable of explaining psychopathological phenomena called 'possession' or 'transference' exists precisely within this framework."

……………

“...Before this profoundly intense stimulation from abnormal sexual desires, all memories and consciousness belonging to Kure Ichirou himself had become as insubstantial as mere shadows, utterly devoid of value. In place of the modern reason and conscience that had dominated Kure Ichirou until now, the unrestrained, intense, wild desires of that genius youth from a millennium past had taken over. And within those memories emerged only one beautiful Moyoko... a figure bearing such striking resemblance to Lady Dai—the sacrifice from a thousand years ago—that it materialized with vivid clarity.”

…………… “……And thus did the specter of Wu Qingxiu’s abnormal sexual desires—resurrected after a thousand years—commence its reckless activity by wielding the modern youth’s judgment, memories, and habits." After leaving the stone quarry at Meinohama, he dashed home and discussed something with Moyoko. "Most likely involving preparations such as unlocking the main house’s storm shutters from within and gathering items like the storehouse key and candles... Then Kure Ichirou waited until the entire household had fallen asleep, sneaked into the main house, and quietly roused Moyoko."

“Now, needless to say, it appears Moyoko had been unaware of the true meaning behind the groom’s demands until this moment. Needless to say, Kure Ichirou had not disclosed the deliberate truth until reaching that critical juncture—instead fervently pressing Moyoko through authoritative commands—so she, unaware this constituted such a terrifying scheme, interpreted his demands at face value, becoming intensely embarrassed and hesitating repeatedly—a situation we can infer from contextual circumstances in Tokura Sengoro’s account. However, despite her gentle disposition, Moyoko ultimately ended up obediently following the groom’s commands. It would be that Wu Qingxiu—now Kure Ichirou—lured her up to the storehouse’s second floor using candlelight... this would be the sequence of events. Therefore, open the investigation records related to that scene.”

……………

“...That’s it. That’s the spot. ‘The dripping of candle wax began from below...’ it would state, would it not? Before the light of that hundred-momme candle, Moyoko—now facing the groom—must have had that illustrated scroll thrust before her for the first time while receiving his fervent demand that essentially meant: ‘Die to complete this scroll.’ Moreover, when she beheld this painting—a true masterpiece that depicted with lifelike precision from facial features to age a nude girl in decay bearing her exact likeness—it became utterly unbearable. This fact—that she collapsed while trembling to the very depths of her bowels and fell into a deathlike state—is clearly made imaginable by phrases in those investigation records such as ‘no signs of resistance or agony’ and ‘strangulation following loss of consciousness,’ is it not?”

“Furthermore, when we consider how Moyoko later exhibited—albeit not to an extreme degree—the psychological heredity of her same-clan ancestors, the twin butterfly sisters of Huaqing Palace, through her depictions in that sixth room… it becomes equally imaginable that the instant she fell into that deathlike state coincided precisely with Kure Ichirou’s reenactment of Wu Qingxiu’s psychogenetic mannerisms from a millennium past—performed in that storehouse’s second floor—evoking with perfect fidelity the masochistic perverse psychological desires and memories Moyoko had inherited from her ancestral sisters Lady Dai and Fenko.”

…………… “...However. “You may find this strange, but cases where states like catalepsy, unconsciousness, or coma accompany the onset and cessation of psychological heredity have been documented in countless historical records and legends since antiquity. From a specialist research perspective in this field, there’s nothing peculiar about it whatsoever. “In ancient times they called this ‘divine possession,’ ‘divine inspiration,’ or ‘kami ascension.’ In extreme cases where this state lasted too long, there are even records—not particularly rare ones—of people being buried after being mistaken for dead, only to revive beneath their graves... “Take Watanabe—the Ise priest who became protagonist of the Noh play *Utaura*. After suffering three days buried underground, he emerged with white hair... This stands as one of the most famous such legends. Psychopathologically speaking, this phenomenon resembles the momentary darkness when flipping an electrical switch from one circuit to another. “Of course, duration varies depending on emotional intensity and individual constitution—but typically, one experiences a shock-like faint followed by complete cessation of bodily functions. Upon reviving, their behavior becomes entirely that of another person... thus commencing a psychogenetic somnambulistic episode... Conversely, those experiencing such episodes might regain sanity after passing through the same dark transitional state. In milder cases like fox possession we discussed earlier, unconscious periods tend to be shorter as a rule. “Regarding nutritional functions and metabolic processes during catalepsy—Wakabayashi has conducted thorough research using Kure Moyoko as his model. While I could parrot others’ findings to some extent, I’ll omit such details here as they’re tangential to our discussion. “In any case, that Kure Moyoko’s catalepsy directly resulted from hypnotic suggestion arising from Kure Ichirou’s somnambulism—this inference lies implicit in Wakabayashi’s investigative documents’ phrasing. I must raise both hands in wholehearted agreement.”

…………… "Furthermore—though this remains my personal conjecture—it appears no accounts exist within the Kure family's history of women like Moyoko manifesting psychological heredity derived from their female ancestors, Ladies Dai and Fen." Moreover, neither Shōkū the monk—who guarded this illustrated scroll by keeping it hidden from view—nor Kōtei, the ancestral founder who restored the Kure family’s fortunes, appeared to have paid any attention whatsoever to this particular point. However, this was because it had been fully understood that the perverse psychological suggestions manifested by this scroll only affected men, while simultaneously proving utterly unimaginable that psychogenetic episodes in men stimulated by these suggestions could influence the psychological heredity of their female counterparts. "However...this instance presents an entirely different situation." "They were anything but strangers to each other." "Shall we call this a once-in-a-millennium encounter? Or perhaps consider it the most miraculous of miracles?—Because Moyoko’s appearance differed not a single detail from that scroll’s protagonist, Kure Ichirou’s psychological heredity came to be dominated by a suggestion of near-perfect completeness, unprecedented in prior examples." Consequently, because he continued manifesting—down to the most minute details of every word and gesture—an exact replication of Wu Qingxiu’s movements from that era, it became conceivable that this inadvertently induced Moyoko’s psychological heredity. "This may seem like imagining an excessively bizarre coincidence of facts, but it is not entirely mere conjecture." "I state this with substantial grounds." "The reason is none other than this:" As the investigation records conclusively proved, if we accepted that Kure Ichirou deliberately used a Western towel to strangle the neck of Moyoko—who lay collapsed in a deathlike state—it became clear this abnormal sexual desire did not have mere female homicide as its sole objective. "One could conclude he did such unnecessary things out of a desire to experience the peculiar pleasure of strangling a woman’s neck—even if she were dead...What do you think?" "If the psychological heredity of abnormal sexual desire from a certain man who lived a thousand years ago has been transmitted with such precise detail down to these minute aspects, wouldn't that make for truly fascinating research material?"

……… "Now then..." "Once this episode subsided, Kure Ichirou waited for the corpse to decay with the intention of using it as a model." "When Aunt Yashiroko peered through the storehouse window at this, Kure Ichirou calmly turned around and said, 'It will decay soon enough,' and such things." "For us hearing these words, they contain a contradiction spanning a thousand years in time and a thousand ri in space... yet for Kure Ichirou himself, both were matters of the present—events unfolding before his very eyes." "The fact that his purpose in strangling Moyoko existed solely for the supernatural psychological satisfaction of that ancient, distant ancestor Wu Qingxiu—this becomes clear when observing Moyoko’s autopsy results stating 'no signs of sexual intercourse'..."

As the monstrous explanation that had continued in one breath finally came to an abrupt halt here, I raised my face while taking a long, trembling deep breath. Dr. Masaki was indeed a great psychiatrist. As I regained that initial respect and somehow began to feel relieved... with that came the realization that my entire body was breaking out in a chillingly cold sweat.

Once again feeling relieved in that state, I asked.

“But… will that Kure Ichirou’s head… recover?”

“Kure Ichirou’s head, you ask?” “Of course it will recover… I have every confidence.”

Having made this declaration, Dr. Masaki smirked sarcastically. He directed a dark gaze at me head-on—as if seeing straight through my face. “That Kure Ichirou’s mind recovers will coincide precisely with your own mind’s recovery, I should think.” Once again, I felt as though I were being given the suggestion that I was the same person as Kure Ichirou, and my heart leaped. Not only that, but there was an indescribable eeriness in Dr. Masaki’s tone—as though the mental illnesses of two people were progressing through exactly the same course toward recovery—that I found deeply unsettling. ……But… however, I casually wiped my face with a handkerchief and asked again.

"Haa... But it must be quite difficult, don't you think?" “No trouble at all. If the cause and course of onset have been made psychopathologically clear as I have described thus far, then the method of treatment has also become properly understood. Especially in cases like Kure Ichirou’s—if a mental disorder with such clearly identified causes remains uncured—then my psychopathology would be nothing but armchair theorizing."

“Huh... So... what method will you use for treatment?” “Yes. I treat it by flexibly applying appropriate suggestions as medicinal remedies—not through unscientific practices like exorcisms or prayers. As I’ve explained, Kure Ichirou’s madness wasn’t caused by physical ailments like syphilis or tuberculosis. He went insane purely through psychological suggestion.” “After viewing this scroll, Kure Ichirou lost all comprehension of time and space—of himself versus Wu Qingxiu, China versus Japan—existing solely through the stimulation of an intense, quintessentially Chinese abnormal sexual desire, surviving on nothing but the delusions, hallucinations, and perverse ideas swirling around this compulsion.” “Moreover, this abnormal sexual desire transformed through the exact same sequence Wu Qingxiu underwent a millennium prior, until ultimately—as discerned from his somnambulistic state in the liberation therapy field—it distilled into a simple craving: ‘I want to see a woman’s corpse.’” “...Kure Ichirou’s hereditary homicidal delusions, early-onset dementia, and abnormal sexual desires... Through Wu Qingxiu’s vengeful spirit’s eyes from a thousand years past, it seemed as though women’s corpses lay buried beneath every inch of soil across the world.” “Thus whenever he saw earth, he craved a hoe.” “And once he obtained one, he began digging up soil with desperate frenzy day after day.”

And so, as this ghost of abnormal sexual desire—transcending both time and space—continued its aimless labor day after day, just as I explained earlier, he gradually wore down. "The hormonal fuel that heightens sexual stimulation—what’s commonly called virility, those endocrine stimulants—get depleted through that very vigor when intense labor persists." Gradually ceasing to feel such arousal, he had fallen into a pitiful state—panting while wielding his hoe, lured only by hallucinations of women’s corpses that surfaced like lingering inertia at his nerves’ frayed edges. The vengeful spirit of perverse desire that had overwhelmed all mental functions now nearly faded away, letting what lay beneath emerge... Ah... how excruciating. "Unbearable." "Why must I keep enduring this brutal labor...?"—a consciousness verging on sanity began gradually surfacing. At times he’d rest his hoe, gaze vacantly about, then resume work as if suddenly reminded. Seizing that moment, I went out and—aligning his exhausted consciousness with my rational focus—posed: "When was that woman’s corpse buried here?" Well, confusion seized him. The concept of “time,” utterly forgotten until then, began reflexively reviving through that single word’s suggestion. With it came: “Huh? “Where even is this place?” Spatial notions stirred too, making him peer about bewilderedly. Simultaneously: “Huh. “Strange. What have I been doing all this time?” Self-awareness rose alongside this, birthing an inexplicable loneliness. Head bowed mournfully, he weakly dropped his cherished hoe and withdrew to his room... This outlines Kure Ichirou’s treatment sequence from the testament. So-called liberation therapy for the mad means nothing beyond observing patients’ freely manifested psychological states this way—gauging illness progression while administering apt suggestions.

Of course, attempting such treatment methods required considerable intellect. "Those inferior minds that randomly assign diagnoses like before—applying shallow surgical or medical treatments, then resorting to restraints or confinement when they misfire, attempting primitive-era remedies unchanged—they're worthless dregs." "The proper psychiatric treatment method to be implemented in the coming world isn't some vague notion." "That is to say, one must possess a mind sharp enough to thoroughly comprehend the principles of mental anatomy, physiology, and pathology through psychogenetic theory while simultaneously—by observing every uninhibited action of liberated patients—scrutinizing from every angle how their psychogenetically inherited somnambulistic episodes transition and transform, then administering apt suggestions at opportune moments to guide them step by step toward proper conceptions of time and space... toward sanity." "Ahahahaha." "I've digressed into self-praise unintentionally... but now..."

Now, returning to our earlier topic—after that, over the course of one month during which Kure Ichirou never once came out to the liberation therapy field, remaining shut away in that Room Seven all the while—it can be surmised that he was recovering various forms of consciousness during this period. Namely, the consciousness of time, the consciousness of space, and the consciousness that acknowledges one’s own existence began to revive gradually like the breaking of dawn, triggered by my suggestions. Things like “Huh... Where is this place? What time is it now? And what’s my real name?” or “Why on earth am I locked up here?”—along with these came various doubts and incomprehensible matters swirling up like clouds, making him wander through thoughts and get lost in contemplation. This is because I had specifically ordered the medical staff to record Kure Ichirou’s daily words and actions in his bedside journal without omitting a single detail, so by observing those records, one could grasp the extent of his confusion as clearly as if holding it in one’s hand. “That street lecture by Dr. Anpontan Pokan which you were earlier made to read by Dr. Wakabayashi was merely something I used as a concrete example of events from that period to explain to newspaper reporters, but even so, it seems that recently such concepts have gradually unified into a single focal point within Kure Ichirou’s mind, bringing him considerably closer to sanity.” In other words, he appears to have developed a resignation-like peace of mind—something akin to thinking “I may not understand now, but eventually I will.” ...This comes after he had fallen into a rather severe depressive state one month prior when he discarded his hoe and withdrew into his room. His appetite had greatly diminished, his bowel movements had become poor, and his physical condition had considerably deteriorated, but afterward he gradually began to recover, and now—perhaps due to the cooler weather—he has improved beyond his previous state, as is clearly recorded in the bedside journal. Therefore, as you can see, he is currently in splendidly good nutritional condition, his mental state seems to have become remarkably clear, and he goes around smiling cheerfully at Anna.

…And so, the fact that the guy who had been shut up in his room until yesterday suddenly appeared over there as if remembering something—whether because the restoration of orderly consciousness in his mind had settled into a temporary plateau, or because the stimulation of sexual desire—revitalized by improved nutrition—had resurged to its former perverse intensity, driving him to come out swinging that hoe once more… Well, we cannot determine that without further observation… In any case, this persistent premonition that Kure Ichirou’s mental recovery is about to reach another turning point right here has been assailing my mind since earlier, you see. “Ha ha ha!”

I had clearly heard these words and laughter with my own ears. ……Along with the voice of that dance-crazed girl beneath the window who had started singing something once more……yet my eyes remained fixed on the blazing green hue of the large desk.

...A crime utilizing applied mental science that no great detective could ever uncover... You yourself must become the detective and investigate this incident's truth... Repeating Dr. Masaki's words in my head while... At that moment, Dr. Masaki’s voice cut off with a click. When I jerked my head up, it was the sound of the electric clock’s hands above Dr. Masaki’s head shifting from 10:56 to 10:57.

“Well... how about that? Quite an entertaining story, don’t you think? Just from this single example, you can see how utterly misguided the treatment methods of past psychiatrists have been. At the same time, my liberation therapy experiment is so splendid—unprecedented in academic history—”

“Please wait a moment.”

I raised my right hand and stopped Dr. Masaki’s words that had been gushing forth like a waterfall. Gazing up at that skeleton-like face beaming with pride, I reseated myself in the swivel chair and asked.

“……Just… wait a moment. ...But... Doctor—are these therapeutic experiments of yours conducted purely for academic research purposes, or...” “Of course... of course they’re for pure academic research. The proper way to treat mental illness is like this... and this fact must be thoroughly conveyed to all those half-baked scholars worldwide—” “Wa... wait a moment. That’s not what I meant. What I’m asking is...”

“...What...” Dr. Masaki hollowed his eyes in displeasure. He hitched up one shoulder and arched back against the chair’s spine.

“What I wanted to ask is this—the fact that the suggestion driving Kure Ichirou’s madness was this Illustrated Scroll… no one else knows about this yet, correct?”

“Ah. “Hmm... Did I not mention that yet? “Of course, no one knows a thing. “Those judicial authority bastards might as well be clueless too. “They haven’t even deemed it worth investigating.”

Dr. Masaki once again smoothly stroked his face and readjusted his pince-nez. "As I’ve mentioned before, this Illustrated Scroll was taken from the storehouse’s second floor by Kure Ichirou’s aunt Yashiroko and hidden away, but Wakabayashi detected it, retrieved it, and handed it over to me as-is. So aside from Wakabayashi and myself, you’re the only one who has seen this painting." "The court and police people have been completely duped because Yashiroko spread her tissue paper over the spot on the desk where this scroll had been placed at the crime scene. On top of that, they’re apparently laughing about it, saying, ‘Dr. Wakabayashi—the maze-breaker—resorted to superstition when he ran out of ways to explain the incident’s truth.’" "I believe there was indeed an exposé in what was likely the editorial section of the newspapers at the time... but on the contrary, it seems villagers who heard about the scroll from Old Man Sengoro are now apparently saying all sorts of things." "They say things like Ichirou received a divine dream message telling him to go to the stone quarry, where he found the scroll placed in the shadow of a tall rock at precisely the twilight hour when spirits walk... Then again, those who don’t believe in such superstitions claim someone infatuated with Moyoko—seeking revenge for unrequited love—devised this prank against Ichirou by drawing inspiration from old legends, and it just happened to succeed spectacularly..."

"Ah—"

“Ah—” I suddenly cried out and started to rise. I pressed both hands against the edge of the massive desk, staring at Dr. Masaki’s face as if to bore holes through it. Dr. Masaki too seemed startled by my outburst, his cheeks bulging with held-in cigar smoke as his eyes widened. My breathing grew ragged, my heart palpitations swelling until I could barely draw air. ……I understood. Understood… How one casual remark from Dr. Masaki had sent a flicker of truth about the incident flashing through my mind…

...Though unrecorded in any official documents, I—this person called myself—must indeed be a young man descended from Wu Qingxiu and the spitting image of Kure Ichirou. ...The two doctors appeared to deny such facts' existence through autopsy results indicating Chiyoko had borne only one child, yet that denial itself might have been merely a trick to involve me in this experiment. My true past might indeed have been that of being twins with Kure Ichirou—separated during infancy for some reason—and I may have been that severed half who was parted from him.

That one had secretly returned to their hometown and secretly been in love with Moyoko. Perhaps that one had taken advantage of being Kure Ichirou’s spitting image, intertwining with the real Kure Ichirou without being noticed, all while performing an ingenious two-person act to conceal their whereabouts. And within that situation, having heard and learned of the strange tale of fate surrounding the Kure family, on the day before Kure Ichirou’s wedding ceremony, I attempted such cruelty…… That was this very me.

...However, I myself—having inherited Wu Qingxiu's psychological heredity—descended into similar madness either simultaneously with Kure Ichirou or shortly before or after him, resulting in my being mistaken for the genuine Kure Ichirou. Which was which had become impossible for even they themselves to discern.

……Drs. Masaki and Wakabayashi are trying to distinguish between us. They’re struggling to determine who’s the victim and who’s the perpetrator.

……That’s it. If I consider it that way, I can fully resolve the fundamental question. That’s it. That must be it. That must be it. There can be no other solution to all these mysteries than this.

……Ah… Was I indeed the true form of this incident's mystery? ……Ah… this very me… Dr. Masaki, leaning back in his chair, kept watching my face—which had been contemplating such thoughts while tormented and trembling in an instant's nightmare—with an undiminished smile. Then, not long after my breathing began to calm, he inquired with an exaggerated look of surprise.

“…What’s gotten into you? “Suddenly standing up like that...”

I answered while panting. “...If I... was the one who showed... this Illustrated Scroll... to Kure Ichirou...”

“Ahahahaha... Wahahahahaha...”

Dr. Masaki, before even hearing half of what I was saying, burst out laughing exaggeratedly and leaned back. “Ha ha ha ha. “So you’re the perpetrator and Kure Ichirou the victim? “That’s rich. “If this were a detective novel, it’d be a classic trick of the ages—though I’d thought it might come to something like that.” “Ahahahaha! "But here's the thing. “But what if the facts were the complete opposite—what would become of this case then…?” "...Huh?...The exact opposite...?" “Ha ha ha.” “There’s no need for you to be so reserved and take on the villainous role of the perpetrator.” “After all, you and Kure Ichirou are spitting images of each other. Depending on what’s convenient, with a mere sleight of hand from me, I could maneuver you to either side—perpetrator or victim—how about that?” “Since it’s all the same anyway, you’d be better off positioning yourself on the victim’s side in this case—how about that?” “Ahahahaha...”

I dropped heavily into the chair. Once again, everything became unclear as to what was what...

“Really now, must you get so worked up every single time?" “Didn’t I caution you from the very beginning?” “Didn’t I warn that unless you study this case with your mind fully braced, you’d risk tumbling into preposterous delusions midway?... I swear this before Nenohama’s Urayama Shrine deities—before Uzurao Gongen himself.” “You’re not connected to this case through some shallow meaning." “...but through far graver and more profound implications…”

“But… but… in an even more grave and profound significance than that…” “…You’re saying it can’t be done, aren’t you? But the very fact that it can be done makes it so strange. This may sound redundant, but I’ll state it once again: The world we inhabit isn’t governed solely by the principles of what we moderns call materialistic science.” “At the same time, unless you burn into your memory that everything—from first to last—is ruled by the principles of idealist science… that is, spiritual science… you’ll never grasp this case’s truth. To put it plainly—when viewed through purely objective materialistic science’s lens, this world amounts to nothing more than a three-dimensional space formed by multiplying length, width, and height. But through purely subjective spiritual science’s perception, our present world becomes a four-dimensional or even five-dimensional realm—created by multiplying those dimensions with either ‘cognition’ or ‘time’.” “The laws active in that higher-dimensional spiritual science world differ so utterly from the material world’s that they might as well be polar opposites. The workings of those uncanny laws should be perfectly discernible from what you’ve already seen and heard in this room alone… You need only seek within that to find the key solving this case.” “…No… The key to this case should’ve tumbled into your pocket ages ago. I distinctly recall having clearly placed that very key into your hands just moments ago.”

“...Wh... What kind of key...?” “That’s about soul separation.” “Soul separation... What about soul separation?” “Hahaha. You still don’t seem to understand.”

“I... I don’t understand.” “Now then... What initially seems most puzzling about this case is that there exists another person who looks exactly like you.” "It’s entirely thanks to this other self of yours that the case has become so thoroughly tangled up." "Moreover, didn’t I just explain moments ago that this is all due to your soul separation illness?" "But... but... something so bizarre... such an absurd notion..."

“Ha ha ha. “You still can’t bring yourself to believe in soul separation illness, I see.” “Well, I can’t blame you for that.” “After all, everyone believes their own head is the most reliable.” “That way everything stays safe and sound in the end, and thanks to that, the story’s logic becomes marvelously interesting—so there’s no need to rush to conclusions like that.” “Whether the culprit who drove Kure Ichirou mad is one person among all humanity, or Kure Ichirou himself, or perhaps the Illustrated Scroll that escaped from the Maitreya statue and began acting on its own... it would be best to consider these three premises carefully.” “And then calmly recalling your past would be the quicker way.”

"But... such a mystical... mysterious fact..." When I got this far in speaking, I could no longer endure my own thoughts and cut off my words. "That's precisely why I'm telling you not to panic. Soon enough, it'll cease to be any mystery at all..." "But... when is 'now'...?" "I can't say exactly when, but today's no good. I've been conducting rather intense spiritual science experiments on you throughout our discussion to restore your memory, but since you stubbornly refuse to recall your past, there's nothing more to be done. Today's experiment ends here. In other words, since your mind hasn't recovered sufficiently, continuing would be futile—"

“But… then what about our previous agreement…?”

“We made a promise, but it can’t be helped. Rather than both of us wasting our efforts, I’ll have you rest a bit more first, then we’ll redo the experiment…” “Wait… just a moment… Then that means you fully understand the true nature of this mystery, Professor?” “That’s right.” “It’s precisely because I know that I say there’s a connection to you.” “Then… please tell me everything.” “No good…”

Dr. Masaki declared this flatly and repositioned his cigar sideways in his mouth. He crossed his arms and laughed coldly while leaning back. While looking at my slightly annoyed face… “Just consider why. To reveal the true nature of this mystery’s enigma, we must absolutely uncover the name of the culprit who drove Kure Ichirou to madness. However, that culprit’s name cannot be considered truth unless either you yourself or Kure Ichirou recall it upon recovering your past memories. Even if Dr. Wakabayashi the forensic scientist has obtained irrefutable evidence, or if I myself have confirmed both the culprit and the crime’s current state—should either you or Kure Ichirou recover your memories only to deny that culprit’s identity, it would all come to nothing. If someone were to insist that the person who showed me the Illustrated Scroll at Meganohama Quarry wasn’t this individual, that would bring down the final curtain. That’s precisely where this case differs from ordinary criminal incidents. …Which is why I refuse to waste breath on such worthless matters.”

I found myself heaving a deep sigh involuntarily. While acutely aware of my own judgment sinking visibly into delusion... “...Still don’t grasp it? “Then I’ll elucidate another grave fact. Attend carefully... In this case, the party presently bearing responsibility for absolutely needing to ascertain that mysterious culprit’s true identity is indubitably Dr. Wakabayashi the forensic scientist, regardless of what anyone might claim.” “Even should police authorities dismiss this as merely an incident stemming from Kure Ichirou’s madness, as a scholar of applied psychological science who has ventured this deeply into criminal research, retreating while abandoning the crucial point would prove fundamentally unconscionable to academic integrity.” “In essence, from Wakabayashi’s standpoint—whether willing or not—he occupies a position where obscuring and interring this case’s true perpetrator remains utterly impossible.” “...However.” “...As for my own position conversely—it diverges entirely.” “Regarding such detective-like exertions and tribulations on Wakabayashi’s part, I bear less responsibility than even an assistant might.” “I have merely fulfilled the role of private consultant.” “Now mark this... Far surpassing that, as inherent professional duty, my exhaustive efforts have focused solely upon your own—or Kure Ichirou’s—‘mental restoration.’ Yet even so, any compulsion to elicit recollections of culprits’ names or visages holds no relevance whatsoever here.” “This derives from my psychiatric perspective—so long as illness etiology and progression stand clarified, merely annotating ‘perpetrator currently unknown’ suffices for research dissemination without impediment.” “...The correlation between Kure Ichirou’s pathological state and this Illustrated Scroll admits thorough explication through psychogenetic principles—its academic publication value already exceeds adequacy twofold over.” “Yet Wakabayashi’s fervent agitation about indispensably unearthing the culprit precipitated this imbroglio... Regardless, I’ve no use for culprits whatsoever... Hah...”

Having made this declaration, Dr. Masaki rested both elbows on the arms of his chair with an air of composure. While looking down at my dismayed self below him, he blew a smoke ring from his cigar. I found myself unable to resist feeling an indescribable antagonism toward his thoroughly scholarly and chilling demeanor. Not only that, but I began feeling unbearable displeasure toward his attitude of ridiculing me only to dismiss me outright, involuntarily straightening my posture and clearing my throat.

“Th-that’s outrageous, Professor... No matter how much of a scholar you are, isn’t that excessively cold-hearted?” “It can’t be helped even if I was too cold-hearted. Even if I were to suffer a crushing defeat assisting Wakabayashi in tracking down that culprit—whether there exists any law that can properly restrain such a person...” I felt heat rising in my eyes. I tried to say everything I wanted to in one breath and be done with it, but found myself unable to speak...

"...Laws... Laws don't matter at all... Unless we track down that culprit and tear them to pieces, there are dozens of people who can't rest in peace. Yashiroko, Moyoko, even that Kure Ichirou... If I'm caught up in this too, then me as well... We've committed no crime, yet we're suffering cruelties worse than death, aren't we?" "Hmph... So..." Having flatly dismissed this, Dr. Masaki watched transfixed as the smoke he'd blown drifted away. I spoke with a feeling as though I were expelling my soul.

“...Then if my soul could escape this body, I would possess someone right now and shout out the culprit’s name lingering in their memory.” “On a main street in broad daylight, I’d proclaim it publicly.” “I’d follow that culprit until death itself comes, and exact a revenge far worse than killing.” “Hmm...” “That would certainly be interesting... if such a wish could be granted.” “But who do you plan to possess?” “Who...? Isn’t it obvious?” “There’s Kure Ichirou—he directly knows the culprit’s face.”

“Ha ha ha! This is amusing—go right ahead and possess him without restraint. However, if you could successfully possess him, it’s not just a matter of clapping and cheering. All my psychoscience research would have to start over from scratch. The fact that souls ‘possess,’ ‘haunt,’ or ‘reincarnate’ is nothing but the effects of the individual’s own ‘psychological heredity’—this has become the most crucial tenet in my academic doctrine, you see… Hmph…”

“I’m fully aware of that. But even if *you* have no need for the culprit, *Dr.Wakabayashi* must require them. Wasn’t the entire purpose of Dr.Wakabayashi entrusting these investigation documents to you solely to extract that final point from Kure Ichirou’s past memories?” “That’s correct. I’m perfectly aware. Though all the experiments Wakabayashi and I conducted since this morning by dragging you into this room ultimately served no purpose beyond that single shared objective... I no longer wish to probe deeper into this case’s truth. The reason will become clear when the culprit’s name surfaces.”

Dr. Masaki once again blew out a long stream of smoke and gave an idle whistle. I crossed my arms while glaring at his chin. "In that case, you won’t object if I take it upon myself to track down this culprit?" "That is naturally your prerogative." "By all means, indulge your whims...but..."

“Thank you very much. I must apologize, but please release me from this hospital. I’d like to go out for a bit, so…”

As I said this, I stood up and bowed, bracing both hands against the edge of the desk. Yet Dr. Masaki remained utterly unfazed. Without bothering to return the bow, he leaned back leisurely in his chair and sent a massive plume of cigar smoke billowing upward. "Going out? And where might that be?" "I haven't settled on a destination yet... But when I return, I'll have dug up the entire truth of this case and laid it bare before you." "Hmph." "Just don't dig so deep you lose your guts."

“Huh…?”

“We’d do well not to break this scroll’s mystery between us.” “………”

I froze involuntarily. Within Dr.Masaki's attitude overflowed a certain force that pinned me down and immobilized me. ...An unprecedented great undertaking... an unparalleled formidable foe... an unmatched bizarre incident... Surrounded by such grand designations—driven even to resolve on suicide, whether in pretense or reality—he was casually ridiculing them all one after another. That tremendous force of audacity... As if pressed down by that power, I slowly sat back down in the chair. Then, as if resisting that force anew, I straightened my posture.

“Very well… Then I won’t go out.” “In exchange, until I discover this culprit, I will not move from here.” “Until my mind recovers and I can unravel the mystery of this Illustrated Scroll, I will not leave this chair... is that acceptable... Doctor?”

Dr. Masaki did not respond. Then, for some reason, he suddenly lowered his hips and began to sluggishly huddle into the chair. He inserted the shortened cigar into the mouth of the Daruma-shaped ashtray, hunched his back, and propped his cheek against the desk—in that moment revealing a demeanor that concealed some grave secret through the cunning glint of eyes casting a sharp glance at me, a small sneer lingering by his nose, and lips pressed tight into a straight line. I involuntarily leaned forward. Every inch of my skin burned with such abnormal excitement that I felt completely enveloped.

“Is that acceptable… Doctor? In exchange, should I succeed in discovering this culprit, I will announce their name at my own discretion—in a place of my choosing.” “And then I will avenge them all—starting with Kure Ichirou’s grievances—alongside those of Moyoko, Yashiroko, and Chiyoko.” “For that purpose… even should I face whatever terrible ordeal… even if the culprit proves to be anyone at all… I will not flinch… Do you understand me… Doctor…?” “To think that cruel monster could trap me in this madhouse hell… kept confined like livestock until death… I absolutely cannot endure it…”

“Hmm… Well, give it a try then.”

Dr. Masaki said this in an utterly nonchalant manner. And then he snapped his eyes shut like a marionette puppet, leaving an uncanny sneer beside his nose...

I sat up straight once again. Feeling as though my own helplessness had been laid bare before my eyes, I suddenly burned with anger. "...Is that acceptable... Doctor?" "I'll try thinking it through myself.... First, if we assume this culprit isn't me." "There's no way something like this Illustrated Scroll could have emerged on its own from the Maitreya Buddha statue and fallen into Kure Ichirou's hands, as the villagers claim—such a thing is impossible." "...Hmph..."

“...Furthermore... Aunt Yashiroko and Mother Chiyoko love Kure Ichirou beyond measure and depend on him as their sole support—they would never show him an Illustrated Scroll bearing such a terrifying legend.” “As for old Sengoro the farmhand, he doesn’t seem like someone who’d do such a thing... And the temple monk serves the Kure family to pray for their happiness—if he knew about the scroll’s existence, he’d more likely conceal it.” “That being so, there must be a suspect among other unexpected individuals unnoticed by anyone.”

“...Hmph...” “That follows naturally.” Dr. Masaki spoke these words in a strange, viscous tone thick with reluctance. Then he cracked open his eyes slightly to look at me. Their color - utterly divorced from the smile lingering by his nose - shone with a pallid cruelty... Before I could fully register this impression, they snapped shut again with mechanical precision.

I grew even more impatient. "In Dr. Wakabayashi's investigation documents—surely there are various leads about such suspects that have been thoroughly examined?" "...Doesn't appear so." "...Huh... Not even one...?"

“Hmm... Mm...” “Then... have all other matters been thoroughly investigated?” “Hmm... Mm...” “Why...? That...?” “Hmm... Mm...” Dr. Masaki kept his faint smile as he began drowsily nodding off. Staring at his face, I was rendered speechless. “Th-that’s... Th-that’s utterly absurd, Doctor... To neglect investigating the culprit while scrutinizing everything else so meticulously... It’s like carving a Buddha statue but forgetting to consecrate its spirit, isn’t it? “Doctor...”

“……………” “...Doctor... Even if it were a prank or anything else—could there possibly exist another crime so cruel... and inhumanely clever to this extent?” "...If the person themselves doesn’t go mad, naturally they won’t be charged; but if by chance they do go mad, everything will become incomprehensible." “Moreover, even if by chance they were caught as the culprit—since they might obscure not only legal charges but even moral guilt—don’t you think such a heinous, cruel prank could never exist again... Doctor...”

“Hmm... Hmph...” “Handing over investigation documents that never even touched on that fundamental issue—no matter how you think about it, isn’t that utterly suspicious, Doctor?”

“Hmm... Hmph.” “...That’s strange... isn’t it?” “Is there truly no other way to reveal this case’s true culprit besides restoring either Kure Ichirou’s or my own mind and having them identify the perpetrator…? Even with two brilliant authorities like yourself fully dedicated to the task…” “...There’s not...”

Dr. Masaki answered as if dismissing a beggar, his tone thoroughly annoyed. He kept his eyes still tightly shut, looking utterly drowsy... I gulped down my saliva audibly. "...What on earth was the purpose of showing this Illustrated Scroll to Kure Ichirou?"

“Hmm... Mm...” Was it genuine kindness from the heart… or a prank… a grudge from love… some curse… or… or…

I was startled. My breath grew labored as though being choked off. With my chest heaving, I stared at Dr. Masaki’s face. The smile beside Dr. Masaki’s nose vanished in an instant……At the same moment, he snapped his eyes wide open and looked straight at me. With a somewhat pale face—his black eyes fixed steadfastly—he quietly turned toward the room’s entrance……but before long slowly turned back toward me and calmly straightened his posture in the chair. Those black eyes had lost the sharp glint unique to Dr. Masaki, taking on an indescribably soft tranquility. In his demeanor as well, all traces of his former brazen impudence had completely vanished. He rapidly took on a kind of divine dignity while simultaneously revealing an indescribably lonely sorrow around his shoulders. As I watched his demeanor, my breathing gradually began to calm. And so—without thinking—I lowered my eyes and bowed my head.

“...The criminal is me...” Dr. Masaki uttered this in a hollow tone, his voice like a murmur. I involuntarily flinched and raised my face. I looked up at Dr. Masaki’s face, which wore a feeble, melancholy smile, but then abruptly averted my eyes.

……My vision grew dark gray. A tingling sensation ran through my skin as if every pore were closing… I quietly closed my eyes. Trembling fingers pressed against my forehead. Though my heart pounded wildly in my chest, my brow felt cold and damp. Dr. Masaki’s desolate voice resonated by my ear. “...If you’ve regained your judgment to that extent... I have no choice.” “I’ll disclose everything.” “……………”

“What need is there for concealment?” “I had resolved myself to this long ago.” “These investigation documents in their entirety have clearly indicated me as this case’s culprit from the very beginning—all while I persisted in maintaining this pretense of ignorance.”

“……………” “Every single word in these investigation documents points at me, insisting ‘You did it, you did it—there’s no culprit but you.’” “...In other words... The first tragedy in Naokata was a crime committed by an individual of superior common sense and meticulous planning—one who erased all criminal traces while deliberately timing it to Kure Ichirou’s homecoming, plunging the case into a labyrinth through skillful use of anesthetic.” “It was absolutely not Kure Ichirou’s somnambulism...”

Dr. Masaki gave a single, quiet cough here. I was startled once more, yet still couldn’t raise my face. I felt crushed beneath the gravity of each word Dr. Masaki spat out... “...The objective behind those crimes is none other than this.” “To separate Kure Ichirou from his mother Chiyoko and have him brought to Hime no Hama through his aunt’s intervention—thereby facilitating his closeness to Moyoko... Given that Moyoko was celebrated as the Hime no Hama Komachi for her beauty, it stood to reason many in the area would harbor... particular interests in her. Moreover, as the Illustrated Scroll’s original location, most residents would know its legends regardless of how little they understood.” “Meanwhile, since Kure Ichirou and Moyoko’s engagement showed no sign of faltering even at ninety-nine percent certainty, there could be no more suitable place than this Hime no Hama—both for conducting this experiment and erasing its traces.”

“……………” “...Therefore, the second Hime no Hama incident is by no means a mysterious event.” “According to the plan established since the Naokata incident, a certain person must have lain in wait near the quarry for Kure Ichirou’s return and handed over the Illustrated Scroll… In other words, these two incidents in Naokata and Hime no Hama were planned by a single human brain for one specific purpose.” “That person was one who possessed both an exceptionally sophisticated understanding of and interest in the legends surrounding this Illustrated Scroll, and who conducted this unprecedented academic experiment by seizing the most opportune moment for practical testing—specifically targeting the peak of victim Kure Ichirou’s anticipation toward some great happiness while fully anticipating his complete mental collapse… Now if I were to say who that person is—who else could it be but myself?...”

“There is…!” I suddenly kicked the chair and stood up. My face flushed crimson like fire— Every bone and muscle in my body trembled, charged with violent energy. I glared at Dr. Masaki’s pince-nez frozen in shock. “W... Wa... Wakabayashi…”

“Fool…!”

A thunderous roar—echoing like forest spirits—burst forth from Dr. Masaki’s mouth. At the same time, he fixed me with a scorching glare from his black, sunken eyes. ...the sheer intensity of those jet-black eyes' light... their solemn dignity like a god judging sinners... their ferociousness akin to an enraged beast... Bristling with rage that seemed to pierce the heavens, I trembled violently without a moment's resistance. Staggering unsteadily backward, I almost immediately fell back onto the chair with a thud. My own eyes remained locked onto those terrifying pupils...

“Fool…!” I felt flames searing both earlobes as I let my head drop heavily. “There’s a limit to recklessness…” The voice pressed down on my head like a monumental boulder. Moreover, it now held an authority and compassion that could be mistaken for a father’s words—utterly unlike his previous listless, desolate demeanor—lurking beneath the surface.

I once again found my chest beginning to tighten for no discernible reason. Dr. Masaki’s veined fingers pressed down on the edge of the desk, putting force into each word as I watched...

“Anyone could deduce that if there’s someone capable of pushing through such a horrifying experiment to this extent—if it isn’t me—there can only be one other person left. Moreover, once you understand that, shouldn’t you immediately realize that person’s name wouldn’t carelessly let slip from your lips? What recklessness!” “……………”

"Moreover, the person in question has already... confessed everything."

“Wh... Wh...”

I looked up in astonishment.

When I looked, Dr. Masaki was biting his lips impassively while firmly pressing down on the investigation documents wrapped in a blue merino cloth with his right hand. Not knowing what this meant, it seemed to be a prelude to uttering some sacred words. Struck by his tense attitude, I lowered my head once more. “The record of that confession is these investigation documents.” “This is something the person themselves investigated the crimes they committed and reported to me.”

A slim, cold streak ran down my back. "...You probably don't understand in detail what criminal concealment psychology or confession psychology really entail... but listen carefully." "As human wisdom progresses... or as social structures become increasingly complex and sensitive... such dreadful criminal psychology will inevitably become commonplace... Do you grasp this?..."

“……………” “...Just how fearsome these investigation documents are... How these two elements within them—the psychology of criminal concealment and confession—with their profound, dazzling, impenetrable magic have compelled this humble scholar to assume responsibility for this crime... I shall now elucidate the reasons...” I felt all my muscles rapidly grow cold and stiff. My gaze was once again drawn to the green felt laid out before me, becoming unable to move.

At that moment, Dr. Masaki gave a light cough. “If we suppose that someone has committed a crime—no matter how completely they might conceal it from others’ eyes—that crime remains within their own ‘mirror of memory.’” “The shameful visage of oneself as a sinner can never be wiped away.” “This is an unavoidable consequence of humanity possessing memory—a fact so well-known that anyone would scorn it... Yet when examined against actual examples, one finds it impossible to dismiss so contemptuously.” “This reflection of one’s criminal self in the mirror of memory perpetually manifests both the intimidation of an utterly relentless master detective and the coercion of an inescapable accomplice—serving as the singular, absolute weakness inherent to all crimes—clinging secretly to the criminal until their final breath. Moreover, one might say there exist only two paths to salvation from this detective and accomplice’s pursuit: ‘suicide’ or ‘madness’—such is the thoroughness of its terror.” “What is commonly referred to in the world as ‘the torment of conscience’ is ultimately nothing more than an obsessive notion born from one’s own memories; thus, to be saved from this obsession, there remains no method other than to utterly destroy one’s own memory... so it comes to be said.”

Therefore, the smarter criminals are, the more they strive to conceal and guard against this weakness; yet their methods of concealment—ten out of ten, a hundred out of a hundred—universally converge upon one final, absolute method. That is to say, they construct a secret chamber in the deepest recesses of their heart—sealing within that darkness both the “visage of their crime” and the “Mirror of Memory”—endeavoring to render them invisible even to themselves. Yet cruelly, this contraption called the “Mirror of Memory” blazes forth with crystalline clarity the darker its surroundings become—exhibiting a perversely rebellious nature where the more desperately one strives not to look, the more irresistibly it demands to be seen, all while emanating an unfathomable allure. Moreover, the more one becomes aware of this fact, the more irresistible its allure grows—so after desperately enduring to the breaking point, they can no longer resist and steal a glance back at that Mirror of Memory. Then, the reflection of their own criminal self in that mirror also looks back at them, so their gazes inevitably align perfectly. Involuntarily shuddering, they end up bowing their head before the visage of their own crime... As this repeats over and over, they finally can no longer endure it—shattering this secret chamber and laying everything bare before others. They point out the reflection of their own criminal self in the Mirror of Memory to the public. “The criminal is me. Look upon this visage of crime!”…they confess beneath the light of day. Then, through the mirror’s rebellious nature, that visage of their own crime vanishes in an instant… Only then do they find themselves truly alone, finally able to breathe easy.

“Alternatively, compiling one’s own memories of wrongdoing into a record and arranging for its posthumous publication constitutes another method to escape this torment. Having done so, when one looks back at the Mirror of Memory, the reflection of one’s own crime within the mirror also watches oneself while anchoring itself against that record. When one laughs forlornly, somewhat reassured, the ‘visage of one’s own crime’ also gazes back at oneself, offering a pitying half-smile. When one looks at that, they regain some composure... This is what I call Confession Psychology... You see...”

Furthermore, suppose there is another person—also extremely intelligent... someone who holds status or trust—who considers placing their crime within an absolutely secure secret zone. Among those methods, one of the most ideal is that which applies the Criminal Confession Psychology I just mentioned. "That is, they thoroughly investigate every last trace and piece of evidence of their own crime with their own hands, narrowing it down to a single sheet of paper that makes it evident without a word being spoken that they must be the perpetrator." They then present the results of this investigation before the person they fear most—that is, the individual most likely to quickly uncover their crime traces. Then within that other party's psyche—through both natural human sentiment and a psychological miscalculation in logical focus—there arises an extraordinarily subtle... indeed dazzling illusion bearing a difference as vast as that between infinity and zero, making it utterly impossible to perceive the person before their eyes as a criminal. At that moment, the criminal can completely reverse their previous dangerous position and stand in an almost absolute safety zone. Once that happens, it’s already a done deal. "Once this illusion takes hold, it cannot easily be returned to its former state." "The more one clarifies the facts, the deeper the other party’s illusion becomes; the more one asserts oneself as the culprit, the more the absolute value of the safe zone in which that culprit stands increases." "Moreover, the degree to which this illusion takes hold becomes deeper the more intelligent the other party’s mind is… You see…."

"It is within these investigation documents that the most profound manifestation of Criminal Confession Psychology and the most sophisticated form of Criminal Concealment Psychology have converged." “Truly, this constitutes criminological research material surpassing even a last testament—unprecedented in history... You see... And furthermore...”

Just when it seemed he had finished speaking up to this point, Dr. Masaki suddenly leapt nimbly from his swivel chair with an air of complete freedom. Crossing his hands behind his back as if stamping down his own thoughts, putting force into each step, he began pacing back and forth across the narrow linoleum space between the large desk and the large fireplace. I remained as before, shriveled within the swivel chair, staring fixedly at the flat green felt surface before my eyes. Within that dazzling green hue, the black burn mark—no larger than a pinhead—I had just discovered gradually began to resemble the face of a small black child... its mouth gaping wide as if roaring with laughter... I stared at it with rapt intensity.

“And what makes this even more dreadful is how the confession appearing in these documents and their criminal concealment methods pin me down without leaving a single millimeter of space... That is to say, should these documents ever be published or fall into law enforcement’s hands, even the most mediocre judicial officer would be compelled to immediately name this humble scholar as a suspect... Not only that... Were I ever to stand trial under such circumstances, this investigation report has been engineered so that not a single word of defense could be uttered—even if I possessed Manjushri’s wisdom and Purna’s eloquence.” “I shall now explain the terrifying intricacies of this mechanism... Listen well... I must disclose why I could no longer remain silent as the principal architect of this hair-raising academic experiment.”

As he spoke these words, Dr. Masaki came to a precise stop at the northern end of the large desk. With his arms tightly crossed behind his back as though bound, he turned toward me and sneered with a grating grin. At that moment, the two glass lenses of his pince-nez, catching the blue sky's light streaming through the southern window head-on, glared and flashed nauseatingly alongside his stark white, fully exposed dentures. When I saw that, I instinctively averted my gaze to look at the small burn mark before me, but the black child's face that had been peering out from within it had now vanished without a trace... At the same moment, I felt goosebumps rising in waves across my cheeks, the nape of my neck, and along my sides.

Dr. Masaki walked silently to the north-side window just as he was. After peering briefly outside there, he immediately returned to the front of the large desk, though his demeanor had grown far more casual than before. He continued speaking in a smooth, youthful voice that still mocked and toyed with such a monumental incident.

“...So here's the thing. "You see... "First, imagine yourself as the judge's mind—rigorously and impartially adjudicate this unprecedented criminal case applying mental science. "As I assume the dual role of both prosecutor and defendant—exposing every last secret regarding the actions of this case's final suspects, namely 'W' and 'M', while simultaneously confessing them... you'll ultimately serve as both defense counsel and presiding judge. "You may even position yourself as a master detective thoroughly versed in mental science's fundamental principles... You see..."”

Dr. Masaki, who had been standing still right beside me, began pacing back and forth across the linoleum floor from north to south with a click-clack of his shoes, coughing once or twice. "...First...beginning from when Kure Ichirou was shown that illustrated scroll and plunged into a psychotic episode...on April 25 of Taisho 15 [1926]...the day before Kure Ichirou and Moyoko's wedding ceremony—both 'W' and 'M' were indeed present here in Fukuoka City, not far from Meinohama." "...M was still newly arrived at Kyushu Imperial University and, having failed to secure lodgings, stayed at the Houraikan inn near Hakata Station—an establishment that doubled as a railway waiting area. This Houraikan was a rather large building with numerous rooms, and saw quite frequent client turnover." "Moreover, being a Hakata-style establishment notorious for rough customer service, it made the perfect spot for fabricating an alibi—as long as guests paid promptly and wolfed down their meals, nobody would bat an eye if they disappeared for half a day or even a night...... Now when we examine W's counterpart to this arrangement, we find him perpetually shut away studying in the forensic medicine professor's office at Kyushu Imperial University's Medical Department." "When busy with work, he would lock the door from the inside and handle all matters via telephone." "When the keyhole was blocked, it had become a quasi-regulatory custom among forensic department members to never knock from outside." "This neuroticism of W’s had become so notorious that even newspaper reporters—let alone janitors and friends—were talking about it, making this habit supremely convenient for manufacturing an alibi."

Now then, on the other hand... As for the date and time of the Fukuoka High School English speech competition that Kure Ichirou was supposed to attend the day before his wedding ceremony—if one had been paying attention to the newspapers, they would surely have known. Kure Ichirou's habit of walking home without taking the train was equally conspicuous—had they investigated beforehand, they would have immediately noticed it... So the plan would be arranged thus: have the entire family of stonecutters working at the quarry ingest some difficult-to-detect poison, forcing them to rest for two or three days to a week centered around that day, then carry out the work during that interval. Now, this place called Meinohama being a semi-fishing village that supplies fresh fish to Fukuoka City means it’s often recognized as a source of epidemics like cholera or dysentery—so using those sorts of pathogens would be convenient enough—but the trouble is these bacteria could prove ineffective depending on an individual’s constitution or their health condition at any given time. In any case, since the forensic medicine department at Kyushu Imperial University shares a row house with the hygiene and bacteriology departments—where research on bacteria and poisons thrives—this arrangement must have been extremely convenient for their preparations. The defining characteristic of this case lay precisely in the fact that they commenced their preparations without the slightest margin for error.

...Next, regarding that day—if Kure Ichirou were to walk home from Imagawa Bridge at Fukuoka City's outskirts to Meinohama across about one ri (approximately four kilometers)—the necessity of passing through that national highway flanked by mountains and rice fields beside the quarry had indeed been mentioned in Tokura Sengoro's testimony, a fact immediately verifiable through on-site inspection. Though the wheat would have grown quite tall by then, combining a deep-brimmed hat with tinted glasses, a thin scarf and mask, along with a summer cloak—then sitting motionless near a stone by the thoroughfare—could have made even their facial features and stature appear markedly different from their true selves... There they would call out to Kure Ichirou as he returned and artfully entice him. “For instance… In truth, I knew your late mother. When you were still very young, I received an extremely confidential request concerning you.” “I’ve been waiting here to fulfill that promise... To put it plainly, even someone as reserved as yourself couldn’t resist being drawn in.” “Then I would solemnly present that illustrated scroll... ‘This Kure family heirloom was entrusted to me by your mother, who deemed it educationally unsuitable for household keeping. Now that you’ll establish your own home tomorrow, I’ve come to return it.’” “This item you must see before marrying Miss Moyoko depicts the ultimate loyalty and love shown by ancestral spouses—your distant forebears.” “Though terrifying legends surround this treasure—warnings that became superstitious deterrents—it truly contains magnificent art and literature.” “If you doubt this, examine it here now.” “Should you decline it, I’ll resume custodianship.” “Whether they actually said ‘No one comes to that high rock’s shadow...’ I can’t say, but phrasing it thus would best provoke curiosity.” Lo and behold, Kure Ichirou fell perfectly into the snare. While he feverishly unrolled the scroll in the rock’s shadow, they could have simply slipped away unnoticed... You see...

...Then moving next to events from two years prior—that is, to the Nōgata Incident that occurred on March 26 of Taisho 13 [1924]—it was established that on that very night too, both W and M had indeed been present in Fukuoka City. ...For on March 25—the day before that 26th—after passing through this university's gates for the first time in ages, he had met with Dr. Saito (then still alive as Professor of Psychiatry), classmates, old acquaintances, seniors, and juniors; subsequently met with the President to submit his thesis and receive the silver pocket watch that had been held in trust since his graduation. He had decided to stay at the Houraikan inn again. Moreover, W had been living a bachelor's life in that spacious house in present-day Haruyoshi 6-chome with only an elderly cook for company since that time, so slipping out after dark and returning by morning had been no trouble at all. In other words, both of them had been situated in locations perfectly suited for fabricating alibis...And whether by coincidence or not, around nine o'clock that evening, a new box-style automobile had departed Fukuoka, piercing eastward into the dark gloom beneath overcast skies. The passenger, bearing the appearance of a coal mine nouveau riche, declared: “Just when the train to Nōgata had already stopped running, an urgent matter arose leaving me no choice.” “Take me to Nōgata at full speed,” he said...”

“Huh... th... then that sleepwalking illness of Kure Ichirou’s was...”

Dr. Masaki passed in front of me and, turning back, sneered.

“...Utter nonsense... A blazing red lie.” “……………” My entire brain suddenly began spinning like a whirring fan. My body tilted perilously to one side before I barely managed to brace myself against the chair’s armrest. “If genuine somnambulism existed, you’d never witness it twice." "...First, doesn’t the very explanation about that bamboo tension rod falling at the kitchen entrance reek of vagueness?" “Suppose someone tried slipping a gloved hand through the door gap to pinch it between their fingers—they might’ve accidentally dropped it then... Or perhaps they removed it effortlessly beforehand, staging its natural fall later... But never mind.” “Even omitting crucial details, hearing my account should make everything clear...” “The reason I diagnosed it as somnambulism will become evident too...”

The spinning in my brain gradually subsided and then quietly came to a halt. At the same time, as the hair on my head began to prickle and tingle, I clenched my back teeth tightly and closed my eyes.

“Your Honor... You must stay focused. “From here on out, it will grow increasingly incomprehensible—nothing but terrifying things lie ahead... Haha...” “……………” “Now then... When you carefully read through these investigation documents, two strikingly peculiar points emerge.” “The first is precisely what you just doubted—that they’ve completely abandoned all other investigative methods, relying solely on Kure Ichirou’s testimony after his memory recovers.” “...and the second is the particular attention given to Kure Ichirou’s date of birth... These are the two points.” “You see...”

"...Now regarding Kure Ichirou's age—this investigation report has inserted a newspaper clipping as reference material. According to this article, after Chiyoko, Kure Ichirou's mother, ran away from home around Meiji 38 [1905], she attended a sewing school for women with some pretentious-sounding name in Mizuchaya on the outskirts of Fukuoka City for approximately one year, during which time she appears not to have given birth to any child... Therefore... If we assume she did not bear a child during that period, we can infer that Kure Ichirou was born between late Meiji 39 [1906] and around early Meiji 40 [1907]." However, from a commonsense perspective, this newspaper clipping serving as material for estimating his age might have been inserted as an extra precaution precisely because Kure Ichirou is an illegitimate child. Alternatively, newspaper reporters who had been eyeing the truth behind the then much-discussed *Beautiful Widow Murder Labyrinth Case* as stemming from an old sexual affair managed to dig up such material. However, since the name Nijino Migiwa—a certain individual connected to Kotei—appeared in that very article, it may well be considered that this was consequently incorporated into the investigation report. ...However... From my perspective, it seems to contain an even more profoundly significant, separate implication. The reason for this is none other than... December of Meiji 40 [1907]—the year in which Kure Ichirou’s birth is estimated to have occurred—coincides with the year that Fukuoka Medical College, predecessor to Kyushu Imperial University, produced its first graduating class… that is, the year that gave birth to us. You see…"

“……………” “Now then, this may appear to an outsider’s eye as a somewhat baseless, unnecessary suspicion—but in reality, it is not." "Among the university students of that time, there was a suspicious individual." "That individual appears to be the very instigator of this incident—indeed, none other than the perpetrator of the Nōgata Incident—yet this investigation report seems to want to declare this truth while being unable to voice it... This is what I call 'Confession Psychology.'" "This exemplifies the timeless maxim of 'confessing without being questioned'—a classic case of self-incrimination through unguarded speech." "The only ones who know the true date and place of Kure Ichirou’s birth—aside from his mother Chiyoko—are W and M."

I forcefully shrugged my shoulders without understanding why myself... Dr. Masaki too fell silent in that moment—a silence so profound it plunged me into an infinite abyss and struck at my chest—but just as I thought this, Dr. Masaki began speaking again. “When I realized that... I shuddered.” “I thought it was myself, but there’s no room for excuse.” “Moreover, the global authority on forensic identification methods to examine Kure Ichirou’s blood and determine parentage lies within W’s grasp.”

Dr. Masaki abruptly came to a halt facing away at the south window. He appeared to be looking down dejectedly while swallowing saliva. I once again pressed my trembling hand against my forehead. While repeatedly suppressing the tremors welling up through my torso, I gripped my knee tightly with one hand. Dr. Masaki eventually let out a deep sigh. As if afraid to look outside, he turned sharply toward me... Silently... head bowed... as though steadying his emotional turmoil, he click-clacked past the large desk before me. Then at the north window, he pivoted at a right angle and began pacing back and forth along the window edge, his slightly stooped figure casting flickering shadows along the rim of the large desk before my eyes each time he passed before the glaring window.

Dr. Masaki once again cleared his throat with great care.

"...About twenty-odd years ago... When Fukuoka Prefectural Hospital was converted into a medical university and rebuilt here in this pine forest, among the young men who entered as part of the institution's first incoming class were two individuals known as W and M." Among them, W pursued forensic medicine while M devoted himself to psychiatry—both fields representing underdeveloped frontiers of medical science at the time—as they perpetually competed for academic supremacy. W, perhaps owing to his lineage from a tuberculosis-prone family, stood as a paragon of masculine beauty among his peers—a handsome colossus who ranked among the most comely students—his nature that of a meticulous, neurotically detail-oriented pragmatist... M conversely had been a squat, ill-favored man since those days, possessing diametrically opposed traits—what one might characterize as an impetuous dreamer with flashes of genius... Thus they had honed their rivalry like clashing sword blades in their contest for scholarly dominance.

...However, as I mentioned earlier, though W aimed for forensic medicine and M for psychiatry—their ultimate professional goals being different—their interest in mental science research, a field so unnamed and unrecognized at that time, coincided as if by some destiny. Perhaps because the diametrically opposed extremes of their cerebral characteristics had fortuitously aligned... but in any case, this led them to seek guidance particularly from Dr. Saito—the authority in that field at the time—though even within this arrangement, their research fervor toward issues bearing scant relation to specialized medicine, such as superstition and suggestion, appeared on the verge of surpassing the boiling point. Though this too was influenced by the guidance of Dr. Saito—who had deep expertise in Eastern philosophy—the fact that both became drawn in succession to this famous, dreadful legend located not far from Fukuoka should rather be deemed a natural consequence.

The two men who had until now maintained a certain antagonistic rivalry and somehow never quite gotten along, upon turning their attention to this legend, forgot everything and shook hands. And so through mutual exchange of opinions—having determined a general research strategy for this problem—W would approach from relatively sober angles like "The Origins of Superstition and Legend in Relation to Mental Aberrations"... while M, in counterpoint, would tackle outlandishly flamboyant titles such as "Buddhist Karmic Retribution Theory Viewed Through W's Research Findings" or "Scientific Study of Transmigration Doctrines Contained in Indian and Egyptian Religions"... In any case, having set their sights on two interrelated fronts—the overt and covert—they resolved to press forward relentlessly... Yet... considering they had committed to such terrifying research themes without even having pinned down the legend's true nature, one can imagine how remarkable their determination must have been at that time. In fact, both of them were determined to trample down all human compassion and conscience, and scatter even gods and buddhas to complete this research. Among Westerners who pioneered new frontiers in science, there were those who employed quite drastic research methods. Particularly among eminent scholars in the medical field, there are countless examples of those who suppressed their conscience for academic pursuits and inflicted extremely cruel sacrifices—indeed, a considerable number who faced societal condemnation—yet all seem to have resolutely carried out inhumane research under the name of academic progress or human culture. In keeping with this precedent, W and M had made a solemn pact to pursue this experiment to its utmost limits—sparing no sacrifice whatsoever.

Thus, with even greater fervor than their academic rivalry, they cooperated in unison to begin investigating this legend. However—most conveniently—the Kure family’s eldest daughter Yoshiko had reached marriageable age and was seeking a groom, yet as is common in rural areas, rumors of the Kure family’s history of mental illness persistently clung to them, leaving no suitors willing to come forward. After exhausting various means in their search, they finally managed to drag in a thirty-year-old itinerant man named G—who at the time ran a small Kyoto-style dyeing workshop in Suzakumachi, Fukuoka—as a makeshift solution. However, due to these circumstances, the legend entwined with the Kure lineage—which had nearly faded temporarily—was now vigorously reviving, proving extremely convenient for their research.

…W and M delved vigorously into those rumors and legends there. While W—under the pretext of historical research—ingratiated himself with Kisaragi Temple’s priest to secretly copy temple chronicles, M, having similarly gained the priest’s trust, pursued his investigation with single-minded focus—going so far as to physically remove the head of the principal Miroku Bodhisattva statue for inspection—and thereby made an utterly astonishing discovery. Namely, they discovered that the illustrated scroll recorded in Kisaragi Temple's chronicles as having been burned by Kotei had in reality never been destroyed—not only had it been securely preserved within the principal statue's torso until very recently, but someone had now discovered it and surreptitiously made off with it to parts unknown.

……This was both a truly unforeseen discovery and a source of profound disappointment for the two men who had intended to content themselves with merely conducting historical investigations into the Kure family genealogy and the legends entwined with it. However, that disappointment proved temporary. The two young men soon regained twice their former courage, strengthened their coordination more rigorously than ever before, and mobilized all means from every direction to search for the illustrated scroll's whereabouts. When they synthesized these results, they identified—with utmost astonishment—that the culprit behind the scroll's theft must be none other than Y's younger sister T, a beautiful female student, which meant... well... matters grew increasingly convoluted. "I may come under some criticism, but what can you do—you're the presiding judge after all… Hahaha…"

“……………”

“...Now then, when the collaboration between W and M had progressed this far, it once again came to a clean break." "...If Toshiko has possession of that illustrated scroll, it complicates matters." "Unlike when it was enshrined within the temple’s principal image, now that a living human has possession of it, stealing it would be no simple matter." "Why don't we temporarily suspend this research here?" “Right.” “Let’s do that.” Though they parted in a surprisingly casual manner—with vague talk of resuming things later that ill-suited their initial fervor—they had clearly seen through to the fact that the reality was anything but simple. Far from being a casual parting, they had keenly sensed—to an almost excessive degree—that the other was thinking, "See what I’ll do… I’ll push through this experiment with a determination many times more fervent than before." It cannot be denied that Toshiko’s beauty was reflected in the two men’s resolve. However, unlike Wu Qingxiu’s single-minded devotion, W and M’s sincerity toward this experiment alone had likely remained unwaveringly consistent to this day. "Of course, both of them are." "Listen..."

“……………” “Now, around that time in Fukuoka, we might call it the pioneering era of square caps—a golden age when university students were so coveted that geishas sang of them becoming ‘either doctors or hospital directors’.” “Even ordinary households debated whether to ‘send their daughters’ to these bachelors, while Kōyōsanjin’s Konjiki Yasha and Kosugi Tengai’s Maharu Koi Kaze seemed to lurk around every corner.” “W and M found themselves caught up in this fervor, competing for Miss Toshiko’s affections—a contest that demonstrated their respective characteristics with regrettable clarity.”

...At first, W gained the upper hand. After all, among those square-capped students of the time, W possessed nothing but ideal qualifications for such matters—a specially tailored handsome man and top scholar to boot, with a demeanor both elegant and courteous, transparently kind... making him utterly unbeatable. Having been effortlessly beaten into submission and forced to abandon all hope of competing in their rivalry, M threw aside his studies and everything else, roaming through fields and mountains while searching for fossils and such, barely consoling himself over certain feelings.

Moreover, W was by no means a simple man to become intoxicated by the fine wine of success. No sooner had he won Toshiko over than he proceeded according to their prearranged plan: "I hear there's an illustrated scroll entangled with dark karmic ties in your family lineage. Why don't we look into it properly?" "Let's research it using the newest scientific knowledge and cut through those dark karmic ties once and for all." "'Unless we do this,' he artfully framed it, 'should a male child ever be born between us, we'd face perilous circumstances'—thus attempting through skillful phrasing to obtain the scroll." Yet even the normally composed Miss Toshiko proved unwilling to part with this particular item, stubbornly insisting, "I know nothing of such things." For one thing, since they couldn't pinpoint where she'd hidden the scroll, they now changed tactics to lure her to Fukuoka. That simply removing her from her environment would compel her to bring the scroll—this went without saying as W's reasoning.

...Now here again came a convenient turn of events—Toshiko's brother-in-law G, a Kyoto dyer by trade, proved to be a hopelessly smirking lecher who began making persistent advances toward his sister-in-law Toshiko shortly after marrying into the family, creating an unbearable plight. Thus when W extended his invitation, Toshiko readily agreed to flee her home and secretly cohabit with him in Fukuoka. On one hand, her elder sister Yoshiko seemed to grasp these circumstances either clearly or dimly and did not press the matter further, making it all the more convenient; however, the whereabouts of the crucial illustrated scroll remained unknown as ever. It appeared that even with W's keen perceptive abilities, he could not discern whether Toshiko actually possessed the illustrated scroll or not.

...However, W remained undaunted. While continuing to comb through Toshiko's surroundings, he even began neglecting his academic duties to doggedly track her movements—a course of action perfectly understandable for someone in W's position. The alias "Nijino Migiwa" that Toshiko had adopted—believing only Kisaragi Temple's priest and her sister Yoshiko would recognize it—along with the ancient Chinese embroidery pieces she submitted to exhibitions, could never have eluded W's scrutiny given his exhaustive knowledge of the scroll's historical context. Thus his deduction that Toshiko must be concealing it somewhere stood as an inference bordering on tautological inevitability.

However, on the other hand, Toshiko herself—the very embodiment of shrewdness—had secretly perceived a certain truth from W’s behavior. Though she couldn’t clearly discern it, W’s purpose in approaching her didn’t seem straightforward. Perhaps that purpose was the illustrated scroll. It seems she had begun to harbor vague suspicions—that his purpose in desiring the illustrated scroll might be…—but she took care not to show any sign of such doubts, so even the formidable W could make no headway. They had been utterly brought to a standstill... Moreover, within this impasse, W suffered an even harsher blow that forced him to retreat with swallowed tears. In other words, just when he had been courting Toshiko’s favor through ever-changing means—treating her as the supreme and only clue in his search for the illustrated scroll—she delivered an utterly unexpected counterblow straight to what might be called his most vulnerable pressure point, leaving him completely defenseless.

This was no coincidence. As I just mentioned, Toshiko had vaguely sensed that his courtship concealed strategic motives beneath romantic pretenses, but another factor emerged when she belatedly learned that W came from a family with severe tuberculosis—a fact his very constitution amply evidenced—while simultaneously discovering he had completely falsified this truth in his dealings with her. Moreover—though this is a digression—when examined in light of these facts, it becomes clear that Toshiko's licentious behavior did not stem from ordinary infidelity, while her callous attitude cannot be outright condemned. Beneath that infidelity, the painful, sorrowful imperative to continue the Kure family bloodline had been powerfully at work. It was none other than this imperative taking concrete form by riding the wave of free love trends that had emerged since Maharu Koi Kaze. While stemming from a fragile woman’s judgment, Toshiko’s heartfelt aspiration—to secure descendants of morally upright and healthy lineage through single-minded determination—becomes unmistakably clear. This psychological state finds corroboration in the derisive rumors circulating among locals when she eloped: “Even if she’d stayed home seeking a husband, that wandering crow G would’ve been her best match anyway.” At the same time, it becomes acknowledged how Toshiko possessed a character combining innocence and reason—one might say she embodied shrewdness itself—and when viewed through such aspects, she comes to be considered a woman born under an ill-fated star.

...And now, here, there is one more thing I must absolutely confess. This is none other than... You may have already guessed, but the one who secretly informed Toshiko via letter about W’s lineage and current health condition was none other than his romantic rival M… that is the fact. This was M—still unable to relinquish his lingering attachment to Toshiko and unresolved feelings about this research—who, acting independently from W, investigated whether someone other than Toshiko might be hiding the illustrated scroll. While pursuing various leads, he inferred Toshiko’s true sentiments from the villagers’ rumors I mentioned earlier and attempted a desperate counterintelligence ploy that struck true. Of course, this was an utterly inexcusable act toward W, leaving no room for justification. Moreover, M began approaching Toshiko again using that letter as his opportunity—such was the situation. But... however... when one reflects on how M’s cowardly deeds from that time have continued to haunt his life ever since, demanding such a terrifying toll up to this very day—it truly makes one’s hair stand on end. "A man who had devoted himself to studying 'Karmic Retribution' found himself tormented by the actual manifestation of that Karmic Retribution, driven to resolve himself to suicide." The irony of this fate... I must confess here my utter inability to even laugh at it.

Even so... How could M at that time have possibly foreseen such a future? Drawn by the psychoscientific allure contained within this legend and Toshiko's beauty, he plunged forward with his initial resolve—to press ahead for academic purposes regardless of what might become of the consequences. Within less than half a year of cohabiting with Toshiko, the signs of her pregnancy gradually grew increasingly pronounced. Soon after entering that year's summer vacation, they began to clearly detect fetal movements... yet... this very stirring marked the quickening of something—a demon god of fate one might say—that would spend twenty long years thrashing to completely dominate the destinies of both W and M. It was the winding-up of a fetus frantically striving to clutch both men's hearts and manipulate them at will—a demonic farce centered on mental science research that transcended blood, tears, duty, and human emotion... None other than the debut performance of this fateful demon god, who had taken the central role in this interminable, suffocating drama of venomous adultery—intent on mercilessly driving every actor toward life-and-death crises. Now, this silent gesture posed to the public at the opening curtain a question: "Whose child am I?" Moreover, from that time until today, not a single answer—whether tangible or intangible—has ever been provided to this inquiry.

Of course, both W and M should possess answers to this question. However, whether those answers were truly grounded in indisputable facts remained something that even W—who later became an authority on "blood type-based parentage identification"—had been unable to investigate. We couldn’t carelessly obtain blood samples from either myself or M... Moreover, Toshiko—the child’s mother, who could have testified to this fact more clearly than anyone—had become what they call a dead woman tells no tales before any such investigation could be conducted, leaving behind not a shred of evidence. If only Toshiko had, during her lifetime, bestowed upon the child the surname of the man she acknowledged as its father and left some written record of this, there would have been no room for dispute or complication—yet regrettably, not a single such document remained. Now that today’s family register merely stated "Father unknown—Kure Ichirou" in simple terms, W and M had become entirely free to either affirm or deny their relationship with Toshiko as they pleased. Moreover, whether Toshiko had been involved with any man besides W and M or not—who but the dead Toshiko’s own conscience could remember such a thing? In short, the father of the fetus conceived in Toshiko's womb would absolutely and eternally remain unknowable unless Toshiko herself resurrected into this world to testify explicitly, or unless she had left behind some unalterable record documenting it.

...That demon god of fate... When born, the child proved indeed quite literally a jade-like male infant. On November 22, 1907, in the detached residence of a leather merchant in Fukuoka's Matsu-en district where they'd been hiding, the birth occurred. Upon hearing the newborn's first cry, M—who until then had maintained restrained silence—finally posed his veiled challenge to Toshiko. He tentatively broached: "They say there exists an illustrated scroll that curses male heirs of the Kure family," though here found his approach slightly preempted by W's prior maneuvers. Then even the formidable Toshiko, seemingly overwhelmed by newfound maternal instincts, surrendered to full confession. Her testimony declared...

...From childhood, I preferred reading books and drawing pictures over eating three meals a day. When I first became aware of my surroundings, I would frequently visit the temple alone to gaze at the fusuma paintings that Master Kotei himself was said to have painted, or study the transom carvings of heavenly beings he had carved, sometimes copying them. As time passed, I would overhear villagers who came to worship—unaware of my presence—discuss various tales about the temple's founding, which profoundly moved my childish heart. And among such stories, there remained something that detailed the origins of this temple in writing. The priest reverently kept it stored away, you know. When I heard such stories, I became unbearably desperate to see it, so I waited for a time when no one was around and, pretending to look at paintings and such while searching everywhere, sure enough, I found the document detailing the temple's origins in a drawer of the Reverend's bookcase.

...When I saw that, I again felt such unbearable regret about the supposedly burned illustrated scroll that I casually went to the main hall and shook the principal image of Buddha—and what do you think happened? Indeed, something scroll-like was inside, clattering in response to my touch, and I was so startled that my heart pounded. ...However, when I told the Reverend about this matter, I was thoroughly scolded. About a week later, pretending to offer incense on my way home from school, I removed the head of the principal image of Buddha and retrieved the illustrated scroll.

However, when I brought that illustrated scroll back and opened it in the deserted warehouse attic, I was startled twice—first by the unexpectedly horrifying images that filled it, then by how they made my stomach churn—and immediately resolved to return it to the temple. But just then, I happened to notice the scroll's mounting work, which was so indescribably exquisite that I became reluctant to give it back. And so after that, whenever I was left alone on house-sitting duty, I would peel off the backing paper little by little, examine the thread patterns through the broken magic lantern lens, and copy them onto pieces of crimson silk. But since discovery would have been catastrophic, I burned everything I made or discarded it in the Murimigawa River.

...And after finally committing the embroidery technique to memory with my own hands, I repaired the peeled paper to its original state and returned the scroll inside the principal image of Buddha—but returning it was far more terrifying than stealing it had been... And since I came to Fukuoka not long after that, the scroll should still reside within that Maitreya statue at Kisaragi Temple.

...But now that my child lay before me like this, I had come to fully grasp the terror of that scroll. Had Sister Yoko borne a male child while knowing of its existence, she would surely have felt the same. Master Kotei must have cursed his own lingering weakness in failing to burn it. Yet no living soul knows of the scroll's survival. I alone hold this secret. Therefore through my sole authority, I offer it as material for your research—use science's power to break its dreadful mystery that haunts only male heirs of our bloodline. Spare this child from its curse. I beg you... I implore you...

Such was her tearful tale. ...M was appalled. ...M was appalled... but also elated. Indeed, in that case, no matter how much they searched, it should never have become clear. Our search strategy and the scroll's hiding place had become mismatched in perfect weasel-game fashion, so both of us ended up searching precisely where the illustrated scroll was not. It was only natural they couldn’t find it—having pursued the workings of chance through the power of reasoning. ...Smiling a sly smile to himself, he came sneakily to Meto no Hama without even informing Toshiko, slipped into Kisaragi Temple’s main hall, and tried pulling out the head of the principal image of Buddha...

"I won't explain the rest... Even if I did, it wouldn't constitute an explanation..." “……” "I leave it to the judge’s discretion."

“……………” “…Through W and M’s subsequent actions… No—here and now in this mock courtroom… There remains no other method but to infer the scroll’s whereabouts based on this prosecutor’s arguments and defendant M’s testimony.” “……………” …M returned from Meto no Hama, silently enduring the cold wind that buffeted him—envisioning that adorable boy’s face destined to fade into unreality upon the experimental cross erected in academia’s name, cursed by six decaying beauty figures through the scroll’s magical power… while contemplating unflinching resolve and strategies for when mother and child would inevitably confront the great tragedy looming over their future…

“……………” "...He returned to their Matsu-en hideout wearing an innocent expression and fed Toshiko—who was obliviously nursing their child—a string of convincing falsehoods." "...The scroll seemed to have been removed and hidden elsewhere by the priest or another party, as it was no longer present within the Maitreya statue's abdomen." "But since we couldn't reasonably demand its return ourselves, he abandoned the matter and came back." 'Once I obtain my degree and secure a university position,' he reasoned, 'it won't be too late to formally request it as academic research material through institutional authority.'" "Having ostensibly settled the scroll issue, he continued: 'My pressing concern now is managing my ancestral estate before year's end.'" "'Regardless, I must return home immediately.'" "'While there,' he added, stitching credibility into his fabrications, 'I'll conveniently resolve your family registry matters too—contact me through these channels if needed...' Having forced their reluctant acceptance, he skipped Kyushu Imperial University's inaugural graduation ceremony two days later and fled to Tokyo." "There he processed residency transfers at full throttle, secured travel documents, and vanished overseas." "This constituted the inaugural maneuver in M's premeditated battle preparations against the impending tragedy—" "—a declaration of war decipherable only to W."

“……………”

"As for W's response to this, it was remarkably composed." "He earnestly donned white garments and stationed himself in his alma mater's research laboratory." "All while comprehending everything, he peered through the microscope with feigned innocence."

“……………” "The differences in character between W and M continued to manifest themselves thereafter. Namely, M wandered through universities across Europe and America, researching psychology, genetics, and the then-emerging field of psychoanalysis, all while keeping tabs on W’s activities through domestic government gazettes and newspapers as he awaited the opportune moment. This was because he disliked bestowing his surname upon that boy, and another reason was to avoid Toshiko’s pursuit. For if Toshiko—possessing a sharp intellect rare for a woman—were to synthesize M’s disappearance with the incident of the missing illustrated scroll at Kisaragi Temple, she would inevitably confront a certain terrifying suspicion sooner or later. Toshiko was certain to consider various reasons why W and M desired that illustrated scroll. And if there were even the slightest chance that through a woman's sensitive mind and desperate maternal love she could imagine the true ulterior motives behind why the two men desired that illustrated scroll, then regardless of all else she would cast suspicion upon M and come chasing after him with eyes transformed. For M understood all too well that she was precisely the sort of woman who might very well cross even national borders in her pursuit, depending on the circumstances."

……Yet in response to this, W—whether aware of it or not—remained as composed and unperturbed as ever. Not only had he openly exposed his own name and actions, but he had successively published famous studies such as Criminal Psychology, Dual Personality, and Psychological vs. Physical Evidence, ostentatiously building his reputation overseas... yet... this was another of W's signature tactics—by thus promoting his renown in this field, it would not only create a sort of "spiritual alibi" ensuring society wouldn't suspect him even when conducting this horrifying mental science experiment, but also provide pretexts to immediately intervene when incidents occurred—a characteristically W-esque scheme balancing dual advantages. In any case, this decisively bold yet transparently meticulous approach could later be inferred precisely from his method of hurling that terrifying experiment's progress report before the very person in question.

Thus, when ten years had flown by and it became the sixth year of Taisho (1917), W—who had been studying in England since two or three years prior—returned to Japan. Upon learning this, M too immediately followed suit and returned; however, the timing of W’s study abroad and return posed a significant problem for M. The reason was none other than this: Nine times out of ten, Toshiko and her child should have vacated their Matsu-en hideout and concealed themselves somewhere after being abandoned by M—but even if they had hidden in heaven or burrowed underground, this was absolutely not something W would overlook. ...At the same time, if W were to undertake overseas study, that would constitute nothing less than proof that he had secured definitive control over Toshiko and her child. In other words, only when it became clear that Toshiko and her child had settled somewhere with no immediate intention of moving could W safely study abroad; therefore, viewing W’s return to Japan through a lens of suspicion, one could not definitively assert that it did not signify the arrival of a time when W was either harboring some concern regarding that matter or putting a certain plan into motion. To rephrase it differently, through W's actions of this nature, M could relatively easily track down Toshiko and her child; the reason M—while studying abroad overseas—had constantly monitored domestic newspapers and official gazettes was precisely because such vigilance proved necessary.

But... however, that W was not the sort of man to show such signs was a matter of course. After returning to Japan, he showed no signs of leaving Fukuoka except for occasional business trips, and day after day as he settled into university life with his packed lunch, he soon advanced from associate professor to professor. He subsequently solved various difficult cases. His fame rose increasingly. In between these activities, asthma attacks would occur... making it quite hectic, but his demeanor remained as composed as ever, and he continued to devote himself day and night to test tubes and blood as if this were a dream from long ago.

But... however, on the other hand, M was not troubled either. From W's post-return behavior, M had already deduced that Toshiko and her child must be residing within a day's journey of Fukuoka City...... Moreover, given that Toshiko—still not yet thirty—remained beautiful, wherever she lived would undoubtedly have become somewhat of a subject for gossip. Moreover, if that child I had been safely raised under his mother’s care without knowing who his father was, then barring any exceptional circumstances, he should have taken his mother’s family name as per M’s plan. As for his age—since he was an illegitimate child, the registration might have been delayed—it had been estimated since M’s return to Japan that he was likely in about the third or fourth grade of elementary school. Then, leaving the rest to dogged persistence, he scoured every nook and cranny with W’s business destinations around Fukuoka as his primary targets—and lo and behold, within half a year of returning to Japan, he discovered I’s name among fifth-grade academic exhibits in the display room of Naokata Elementary School’s Tanabata festival. However, until that point M had been oblivious, having failed to notice that due to I’s exceptional academic performance, he had skipped a grade to become a fifth-grader while still being eleven years old—so much so that M even briefly suspected it might be a different person altogether.

...But... what divine will had set this in motion? Before long, a student who entered that display room happened to turn around, his backward glance intersecting perfectly with M's gaze; in that moment, M found himself powerless to look away. Fleeing through the school gates, he instinctively covered his eyes, cursing his very existence as a scientist. He confirmed the student bore his mother's likeness entirely—no trace of W's features in his countenance or bearing, nor even any resemblance to himself. Though he sighed in relief, he immediately cursed that sigh itself. ...That face soon to be crucified on academia's cross and transformed into something monstrous—how radiantly beautiful it had been... how flawlessly formed... how boundlessly gentle and innocent in demeanor... Was this what they meant by Bodhicitta?... Try as he might to swat them away, the boy's pure crystalline eyes kept flickering before him. M wandered streets singing hymns of the "Madhouse Hell" awaiting the child, publicly flaunting his shame while performing penitence. He struck the wooden fish relentlessly, conducting memorial rites for the boy's afterlife. ...So exquisitely had that child been nurtured in beauty and purity.

W must have been peering through the glass window of Kyushu Imperial University's forensic medicine classroom at M's actions, secretly forming his characteristic sneer on that pale face. Through his understanding of M's psychology in fleeing overseas, he was certain M would inevitably return to Japan. He must have been convinced M would return to this very Kyushu before I reached adolescence. And he must have been waiting there, having completed all research related to this experiment and made every preparation.

The truth was that M himself was, from head to toe, a slave to academia. The ardor with which M yearned to incorporate this experiment's results into his lifelong research objectives—the scientific principles of 'Karmic Retribution' or 'Reincarnation,' that is, the conclusions of 'Psychological Heredity'—showed no regard for whether it surpassed or fell short of the fervor with which his counterpart W, devoting heart and soul to his celebrated work Crime and Its Evidential Traces in Applied Mental Science, sought to integrate this illustrated scroll's magical power as a case example. That this illustrated scroll possessed such research value and allure was something W never once doubted.

But... but... even so, how much profound anguish did M continue to accumulate thereafter? How excruciatingly difficult he found it to resolve himself—to sacrifice his conscience for academia, to squarely face an innocent boy having his soul extracted while still alive... to examine that living corpse with his own hands... and then publish those results triumphantly—how painfully he came to realize this difficulty. Was not his frenzied research over the dozen years following his university graduation born from this single-minded desire to forget the torment of his conscience?... Was it not the same wretched psychology as one who polishes a guillotine blade with desperate intensity to forget the agony of serving as witness to executions? "And so his academic research... To decisively put an end to this guillotine-blade polishing, what was the fundamental assertion of the doctoral thesis he submitted to his alma mater?... It declared... 'The brain is not the organ of thought...'"

“……………”

"...Thus M's personal anguish finally succumbed to academic ambition." "He regained his original resolve to charge blindly forward—forgetting all else—to shatter through 'The Dark Age of Madmen' spanning the globe and the 'Insane Hell' festering within it through his own theories." "With a calm cruelty likely matching W's own, he could now count I's age on his fingers." “……………” "Toshiko’s fate hung like a candle flame in the wind." "By that time, she must have plumbed the deepest depths of what that romantic drama between W and M—once staged around her—had truly meant." "She had reached a point of absolute certainty that their passion for her had been nothing but dual calculations—the scroll’s bewitching power paired with her physical allure—and nothing more." "She became utterly convinced the scroll thief must have been either M—to whom she’d revealed its location—or W nursing his romantic grudge... Yet even while fully grasping how fearsomely outmatched she was against these men with her fragile woman’s hands, she must have clung desperately to her child, trembling in battle."

Thus she—Toshiko—must have tremblingly envisioned in the deepest recesses of her imagination what she dared not fully acknowledge: that if even one in ten thousand practical tests of the illustrated scroll’s magical power were conducted upon I, Toshiko would immediately recall two names. W or M…? “……Therefore…… Toshiko’s death was an absolutely indispensable first condition in preparing for this unprecedented academic experiment……” “Ah! D-Doctor… Wait… Please stop… Th… Such terrifying… Things…”

I involuntarily let out a scream. I collapsed flat onto the large desk. My head felt as if it were boiling... my forehead was cold as ice... my palms burned like fire—all while I stifled my heaving, gasping breath. “What... What are you saying...? Aren’t I explaining this precisely because you came pressing me with questions?” Dr. Masaki’s voice, containing an irresistible resilience, came crashing down upon my head. ...But he immediately changed his tone, adopting an admonishing manner.

“What’s with this spinelessness? How can there be someone who, after making another person divulge a grave secret concerning the fate of their entire life, suddenly says ‘Enough!’ without any reason halfway through? Put yourself in my position—actually fighting this case! Try to comprehend the suffering I’ve endured overcoming every disadvantageous situation… There are still more terrifying things to come… From here on…”

“……………”

“Listen... Toshiko must have been aware to some extent of this incident’s first condition.” “The fact that she told I, ‘If I remain unharmed until you graduate university, I’ll tell you everything,’ stands as clearest proof that Toshiko—out of excessive love for her child—had agonized over every possibility until finally growing suspicious to that very degree.” “In short, Toshiko’s life during that period must have been a life-and-death struggle—on one hand keeping I far from this curse, saying nothing until he could develop the mental capacity to both understand and guard against its true nature... waiting patiently while shielding him from temptations of scrolls and stories; while secretly searching for M’s whereabouts to confirm the scroll’s existence.” “Otherwise, she wanted to use her own strength and cunning to confront W and M and make them confess everything.” “She wanted to resolve this terrifying conflict between academic ambition and carnal desire.” “And if possible, she wanted to destroy the scroll with her own hands... Such utterly wretched maternal love must have been swirling through her mind.”

...However, those two former lovers of Toshiko's had been sworn enemies for twenty years—no, they were fated mortal foes from time immemorial. In human affairs they were bitter adversaries; in academia, comrades bound by mutual hatred. Thus with Toshiko and her child trapped between them, they had spent years exchanging curses until both had transformed into irredeemable demons of scholarship. They were men who had lost all means of survival save spiritually devouring one another. Moreover, combining the utmost active malice and passive spite from their mutually loathing hearts, they whetted their fangs with single-minded focus—to test the scroll's cursed power upon I, who should have been either man's child—that they might claim academic glory by publishing the results while fastening all guilt for these inhuman acts about their rival's throat. Whose child this sacrifice might be... such considerations had long since ceased to matter. "As long as the boy bore confirmed male lineage from the Kure bloodline, they considered it fully adequate for scholarly purposes."

This time, at last, an unbearable shudder welled up throughout my entire body. I clutched my head tightly and collapsed onto the green baize. Dr. Masaki’s heartrending voice... Each razor-sharp word like a scalpel menaced my entire nervous system as...

“The result has finally come.” “It came to pass exactly as M predicted twenty years ago.” “M had been compelled by demonic inevitability to return to that terrifying starting point from which he had fled—trembling and thrashing in desperate fear.” “Twenty years ago, his graduation thesis 'Fetal Dreams'—the very work that drove M into exile—had through unseen forces of fate been relentlessly dragging him back to his origin.”

I wanted to leap up from the chair and escape the room. But my body remained fused to the seat by some mysterious force, doing nothing but continuing to tremble uncontrollably. I couldn't even cover my ears. Dr. Masaki's hoarse voice came flying into my ear canals, each phrase razor-sharp. "...And thus the primary obstacle to this experiment's progress...Toshiko's life...was completely eliminated." "Toshiko—the sole living witness who could connect the pasts of W, M, and I; who could definitively testify to whose child I was while simultaneously exposing this terrifying experiment's perpetrator with a single word—this 'living evidence' was buried within a perfect labyrinth as planned." "The next problem became fulfilling the experiment's second requirement...namely...M assuming the professorial chair at Kyushu Imperial University's Faculty of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry." "In other words, this was an absolutely indispensable condition—utterly flawless and layered with infinite precautions—both to conceal the potential perpetrator's whereabouts should our results ever face scrutiny; to completely safeguard our mutual secrets while ensuring absolute security; and furthermore, to transfer full culpability for these criminal acts onto our rival when circumstances permitted."

Dr. Masaki, who had been clacking around the floor until now, came to an abrupt halt the moment he finished speaking. I realized—as I lay collapsed—that this was precisely before Dr. Saito's portrait hanging on the eastern wall and the calendar displaying the date "October 19, 1926 (Taisho 15)". Just as Dr. Masaki’s footsteps ceased, his words cut off sharply—and with the room unexpectedly locked in silence, I, who had been straining my ears toward those sounds alone, felt as though he had suddenly vanished from existence.

……But… remaining with that thought, I strained my ears in silence—it must have been a mere two or three seconds. Before long came the creeping realization of what that silence meant—how utterly terrifying it was… Before I could even process "Now... now...", all manner of questions from this morning flashed anew through my mind all at once. Involuntarily clutching my hair with both hands, I waited for Dr. Masaki’s next words as if pierced by needle tips.

...The secret of October 19... ...the secret of Dr.Saito's unnaturally deceased corpse that was discovered that day... ...the secret of the hidden mechanisms behind Dr.Masaki's appointment as psychiatry professor—mechanisms causally linked to Dr.Saito's unnatural death... ...the secret of the demonic hand of fate that drove Dr.Masaki to resolve upon suicide yesterday—the very same month and day marking its first anniversary... ...the secret of Dr.Wakabayashi's muddled consciousness and psychological state—he who had bizarrely declared Dr.Masaki already committed suicide a month prior—...

...And then... another great secret that must surely be lurking behind all those secrets' reverse side—reigning over every last one of them... ...Everything was the deed of a single person... ...W...? M...?

...That all might be illuminated like a bolt of lightning through Dr. Masaki's mere single word about to be uttered next... This dark silence... this stillness... before unspeakable terror... But before long, Dr. Masaki began walking away from there with an unconcerned gait—clack-clack. During that brief silence, he skipped over the part of the explanation I had been dreading and continued his account. “And thus, soon after M succeeded Dr. Saito and assumed his post at Kyushu Imperial University, this unprecedented experiment in academia was carried out.” "And thus, the entirety of those results was cast out here before me."

“……………” “……So…… at present, both W and M are equally guilty. Even if they claim otherwise, there’s no evidence to exonerate them.” “……………” “...Therefore I have steeled my resolve. Through that draft of the Psychological Heredity appendix you’ve been reading since earlier, I’ve managed to completely conceal even the truth of the Hōkō Incident. I invoked examples like long-necked demons and corpse-devouring spirits—after enduring excruciating hardships—aligning everything so thoroughly that even if published as academic research material, it would reach a level where one could claim innocence.”

“……………” “...To bury those hidden truths as an absolute secret between just us two... casting aside all resentment and suspicion... for academia's sake... for humanity's sake...”

“……………” “...This too could be called bodhicitta, if one were to name it as such.” "...it must have been because I couldn't bear seeing that maddened state of Kure Ichirou..." Dr. Masaki’s voice grew thick with tears as he approached directly before me—still collapsed over the desk. ……A heavy thud resonated as he sank into the swivel chair. ...Then... with a light clink, he placed his pince-nez on the desk's edge, pulled a handkerchief from his pocket, and appeared to dab at his eyes.

But at this moment... though I didn't know why... the shudder that had been coursing through my entire body stopped dead all at once. Instead, I could do nothing to stop a completely different, indescribably unpleasant emotion—provoked by Dr.Masaki's tearful voice—from seething up from the depths of my gut. And so, maintaining my previous posture—almost perfunctorily collapsed over the desk... toward Dr.Masaki: Rant however you want or cry as you please. I became utterly cold-hearted, feeling like a complete stranger who wanted to say: Though this has absolutely nothing to do with me, I'll listen to even a morsel of what you have to say. This was an utterly mysterious change in psychological state, even when considered afterward. I myself couldn't understand why my feelings had shifted so, but remaining exactly as I was—without moving a muscle while collapsed over the desk—there was no way Dr.Masaki, engrossed in his own narrative, could have detected this change in my psychological state.

Dr. Masaki, right before me as I remained like that, gave a light cough-like sound to adjust his voice... Then, changing his tone, he adopted an extremely solemn manner of speaking. From above my head, as if pressing down, he enunciated each phrase sharply. “...Only... here exists... a human being called you...”

“……………” “You are the successor to this undertaking, chosen by me and Wakabayashi.” “...No... To tell the truth, neither I nor Wakabayashi are individuals qualified to publicly announce this undertaking’s final results to society.” “Only you who sit there have been chosen to bear this sacred mission—the one supreme angel dispatched before us.” “You who don’t even know what this divine mandate entails… who remain utterly ignorant… a pure and innocent young man in the truest sense.”

“……………” "...The reason is none other than this: “Both I and Wakabayashi—to confess with complete honesty—do not wish to publish the truth of this incident ourselves in such falsified form. "If at all possible, we wish that after our deaths, an appropriate third party would correct it into its true form and publish it... This is the lifelong wish of us two." “It is the hope born from the conscience of scholars of pure and single-minded sincerity.” “…That is why Wakabayashi and I, without exchanging a single word, have united in cooperation and exerted all efforts to restore the mind of you—who holds such critical ties to this incident… The moment you recover your own past memories and return to your former state of consciousness, you will assuredly realize with perfect clarity that there exists no successor to this work other than yourself.” “And thus, in a state of amazement and emotion enough to die, you will undertake the publication of this unparalleled research—astounding and shocking all humanity… Through that publication, you will in one stroke illuminate and shatter the dark age of lunatics since time immemorial, overturn and annihilate the lunatic hells across the world from their very foundations, and flip this all-conquering materialistic science’s dark world en masse into a luminous realm of spiritual culture.” “...And simultaneously—by having you preemptively stem the coming era of rampant crimes through applied mental science—not only will you ensure that sacrifices like that pitiful youth Kure Ichirou need not be buried as meaningless casualties, but you shall have all humanity offer up their gratitude and condolences to them... And finally... while harboring absolute conviction that you will let us two harbor upon our posthumous lips an eternal 'cold smile' like polar ice... we strive on, compressing what little remains of our lifespans into mere instants.”

“……………”

“However... from your current perspective, this must seem like an utterly incomprehensible and irrational demand.” “You may misunderstand that Wakabayashi and I are attempting to complete false academic research by using you—the spitting image of Kure Ichirou—as some kind of substitute, then publish it through fraudulent means.” “But... but... I swear by the spirits of heaven and earth.” “It is precisely in the private dealings between us two that all manner of falsehoods may reside, but within the academic experiments we are conducting and the principles to be proven thereby, there exists not a single speck—not the slightest trace—of falsehood.” “However, it was only in the form and method of presenting those findings—wholly unrelated to their substance—that unavoidable falsehoods had become mixed in; but even those I have just now corrected into their true form and reported to you.”

“……Therefore…we want you to trust us unreservedly… You are undoubtedly the sole person responsible for rectifying and publishing this experiment’s progression in its true form.” “That is to say—we firmly believe that when you regain your past memories, it will become evident that you are the one chosen by divine will to synthesize Wakabayashi’s investigative records with my testament, draw unified conclusions, and present them to academia… No, this conviction extends beyond Wakabayashi and myself.” “Even should the public somehow learn your full name—a name already repeated countless times in our discussions and surely etched in societal memory—merely hearing it would confirm more clearly than witnessing flames that none but you are fit for this task.” “…Thus, the instant I discerned your mental state beginning to recover, I could at last compose this testament with assurance.”

"...However, my resolve to commit suicide stemmed from an entirely different reason. This was neither because that major tragedy erupting yesterday noon in the Liberation Therapy Ward had stimulated my sense of responsibility, nor because this day coincidentally fell on the anniversary of Dr. Saito's death—making me perceive some form of divine will or impermanence. To tell the truth, I have grown disgusted with humanity. Had I not been conducting even this sort of research, I would have been made utterly sick by the shallow, base nature of this human world—filled with beings possessing no better use for their brains."

"...And even that—if it were some clever research like blowing up this botched world with newly invented explosives or hatching humans from frog eggs—might still be worth enduring, but to prove a single straightforward principle like psychological heredity—something even a three-year-old could grasp—someone had to toil until their legs turned to sticks and their brains to stone." "Even if someone, tenaciously entangled in all manner of vile karmic connections and plunged into what could only be called hellish suffering, finally manages to prove the truth—what reward remains for them?" "Far from spending my remaining years in tranquility surrounded by wife, children, and relatives, the moment my research sees the light of day will be the moment of my lifelong ruin." "That’s when they’ll call me an outrageous bastard, stomp and kick me, spit in my face… ‘Serves you right!’—that’s what this is."

“……………” “...That I’ve failed to realize until this very day how this has spiraled into such a shameful, undisciplined conclusion—I’ve grown utterly sick of my own stupidity.” "I want to renounce being both human and scholar simultaneously and revert to my constituent atoms." "I want to lay out everything before you..." “……………”

“...This current mentality of mine must naturally stand in complete opposition to Wakabayashi’s present state.” “Wakabayashi has undoubtedly entrenched himself to obstinately cling to this experiment and battle me to the bitter end... Particularly since he knows tuberculosis has seized him, with little life remaining.” “...Therefore, the instant I perceived your mental state—which ought to shoulder responsibility for announcing this incident’s final conclusion—beginning to recover this morning, I performed various acts—shaving your head, dressing you in university attire, arranging meetings with her—to make you acknowledge yourself as Kure Ichirou posthaste, recruit you as an ally, and have you issue a favorable announcement... I grew desperate.” “...No... Even now, an invisible net stretches around you and me—and I keep hauling it toward myself with unrelenting force.”

“……………” "...However, I originally had no need to engage in such a troublesome battle. After all, I had intended to become an electron or something and serve as a comet's herald—and though my assets are meager, I planned to entrust all property to Wakabayashi along with the documents as a token of gratitude for publishing this truth, to be formally handed over after your mind recovered. Moreover, regarding the publication's content itself, until just moments ago I'd been of the mind that as long as one grasped Psychological Heredity's general principles, the criminals' names in the appendix's case examples didn't matter... Let them do as they damn well please..."

"...But I suppose this must be what they call karmic retribution... The longer I watched that bastard Wakabayashi over there—with his signature meticulous methods—slipping you hypnotic suggestions while trying to drag your mind toward his own convenient conclusions, the more my congenital irritability began seething within me. But as his transparent scheming grew increasingly repulsive—nauseatingly so—I resolved to counterattack... which is why I've come here..."

“But then again... while talking with you like this... just now... my mind seems to have shifted once more,” “Putting logic aside... everything appears unbearably bothersome.” “It’s all just shoddy work deserving divine punishment anyway.” “Let what follows become fields or mountains.” “I feel compelled to smash everything to pieces at once...” ......This couldn’t be happening...... “...I shall liberate you and that Moyoko from this hospital room immediately.” “Then burn every last document here—render them utterly worthless.”

“……I declare this with certainty……. ...That girl Moyoko from Room Six is absolutely not the young woman who should become the wife of that handsome youth standing in the corner of the Liberation Therapy Ward. Legally speaking and morally viewing, she is indeed the woman right there destined to become your future wife. That this pitiable young woman—who pines away in anguish day and night to become your better half—is undoubtedly she, and that this holds not a shred of doubt even from a scientific standpoint, Wakabayashi and I swear upon our professional honor.”

“……At the same time, from my professional standpoint, I will assert one more thing……. “…Unless you do this… unless you willingly enter married life with Moyoko-san yourself, we—Wakabayashi and I—have finally realized that no matter how strenuously we exert ourselves from without, you will never escape your current self-obstruction… this ‘Ego-Loss Syndrome’.” “That this is the sole final means capable of saving both Moyoko-san and yourself has at last become clear through the results of various experiments conducted from the very beginning… Of course, I say this not to force you into anything against your will.” “To cure your current self-obstruction—this ‘Ego-Loss Syndrome’—stemming from your rigid celibate life, this is the most effective, ultimate mental scientific therapy we’ve reserved for the very end.” “As for the principles underlying this therapy, even Freud the psychoanalyst and Steinach the sexology specialist entirely share my theory…”

“The effectiveness of this definitive treatment method would become immediately apparent—more certain than two plus two making four.” “The proof lies in evidence.” “That none of my words are fiction shall resurge boundlessly within your recovering memory—the moment you enter a blissful married life with her.” “That those mysterious and bizarre events culminating until now bear no relation whatsoever to that handsome youth—your mirror image smiling in his Liberation Therapy Ward—will be proven through your own crystalline self-awareness.” The truth that all those astonishing events directly concerned you yourself would flash into clarity—as vivid as flipping an electric switch. “...Because when you wed his daughter, you’ll be freed from that physiological cause now clogging your mind with tension... All memories you’ve struggled to recall will parade before you in perfect formation.” “Simultaneously—as you pierce through layer after layer of this incident’s truth that now torments you... When you sigh ‘Ah... so that’s how it was’... At that very instant of entering domestic bliss—materially abundant, spiritually fulfilled—you’ll publish academia’s true account of these events from your impartial intellect... Submit Wakabayashi’s and my labors to justice’s scales... Through this publication force modernity’s derailed culture onto new tracks... All this—I swear upon my professional honor once more... For your honor and Moyoko-san’s happiness—”

“...N-no!...”

I suddenly sprang up with tremendous force. Trembling all over with fiery indignation, I rose from the swivel chair. Looking down at Dr. Masaki’s face—mouth agape and dumbfounded—I ground my teeth with a grating sound, my lips quivering. “I... I refuse.” “M... m... No way... Ab... absolutely refuse.” “……………”

All the unpleasant feelings I had been desperately holding back since earlier could no longer be stopped from bursting out through my mouth. “I... I might be a mental patient... I might be an idiot. “But I still have my self-respect. “I believe I still have my conscience. “...Even if she were the most beautiful woman imaginable, I absolutely cannot unite with someone whose lover I cannot even recognize myself to be—merely for treatment’s sake. “Even if it’s known to be certain legally, morally, and academically, my conscience cannot accept it. “...Even if that woman were to recognize me as her rightful husband and pine away in love for me... “As long as I myself have no such memories... as long as I don’t recover those memories... how could I possibly do something so shameful and shameless? “...And... and... as for publishing such abominable research... wh... who would... e-even...”

“Wai... Wait...”

Dr. Masaki, remaining seated, turned deathly pale and raised both hands.

“B-but... for academia...” “D-don’t... Won’t... Won’t do... Absolutely won’t do!”

Tears began streaming uncontrollably from my eyes, making Dr. Masaki's face and the room's scenery grow hazy and indistinct. Without even attempting to wipe them away, I kept screaming. "What does academic research matter? What does any research matter? What have those barbarian Western scientists accomplished? I may be insane, but I'm Japanese! I still retain awareness of bearing the Japanese race's blood in my veins! I'd rather die than become subject to such cruel... shameless... Western-style academic research and experiments! If academic research truly requires committing such defiling, shameless acts... if I'm truly someone who must be involved in this research... then I'll smash this skull of mine along with those past memories... right now... this instant!"

“Tha... tha... that’s not it... The truth is you... you are Kure Ichirou’s... Kure Ichirou is...” As he spoke these words, Dr. Masaki’s demeanor began crumbling into disarray. The audacious, sallow complexion that had seemed unflappable even if heaven and earth were overturned turned crimson in an instant, then changed to pallid just as rapidly. His panicked demeanor—crouching while extending both hands to intercept my words—swayed and wavered through the newly gushing tears that kept welling up from my eyes. However, I did not listen to the end.

“No! No!” “Whether I’m connected to Kure Ichirou or not... whatever my circumstances may be, it changes nothing.” “A crime remains a crime no matter who hears it!” “……………” “You professors can indulge in your academic research however you please—live or die as you wish... But what of the Kure family members you’ve reduced to playthings for your studies? They never wronged you in any way.” “That’s not all.” “While trusting you, respecting you, relying on you... aren’t we being deceived by those very same professors and turned into lunatics?” “Aren’t they being forced to bear children for academic experiments more horrifying than anything in this world?” “How will you professors answer for their countless grievances? Parents and children who loved each other unto death... lovers torn apart by your hands and subjected to crueler tortures than hell itself—how will you restore them?” “Are you declaring that nothing else matters as long as your academic research continues?”

“……………” “Even if you don’t dirty your own hands, it’s all the same. “Do you think having others publish confessions of your sins will make everything vanish?... That being tormented by your conscience alone can purify your guilt?” “……………” “Isn’t this... isn’t this too cruel?” “……………” “Se... Doctor...”

As I shouted, my vision began to swim, and I involuntarily braced both hands against the large desk. With everything now invisible through the newly gushing hot tears, I gasped for breath. "I implore you... I implore you... won't you accept your punishment?... And... won't you ensure those pitiful people's sacrifices aren't in vain?... I'll gladly... I'll gratefully take on publishing that research myself... won't you allow me to?"

“……………” “As the first step of your punishment, I’ll bring Dr. Wakabayashi here and make him apologize before you.” “Was it some grudge over love... why did you commit such horrifying... inhuman acts... I’ll force him to confess everything...” “……………” “Then... both you and Dr. Wakabayashi must apologize to the victims.” “Go before Dr. Saito’s portrait, Chiyoko’s grave in Naoagata, that madman Kure Ichirou, Moyoko, and Ms. Yashiroko—confess what you did to each one.” “Even if you say it was for academic research... please... both of you apologize sincerely from your hearts...”

“……………” “That’s all I’m asking… Please… Please… I’m begging you… Here I am… begging you…” “……………”

“Th... then... I don’t care what becomes of me. “Whether it’s my hands, my legs, my life—anything at all—I’ll give them to you. “...If you order me to take over this research... even if it takes my entire lifetime... even if I must bear all the sins...”

I could no longer bear it and covered my face with both hands. Tears gushed through the gaps between my fingers. "...Th...this cruelty...this cold-blooded crime...Ah...Ah...My head is already..."

I collapsed onto the large desk. A sound that couldn’t be suppressed sobbed out from beneath both hands, despite the effort to keep silent. “I-I’m sorry... but... please... let me... take everyone’s... re... revenge...”

“……………”

“...Make this research... sa... sacred...” “……………” “……………” Knock knock... knock knock... came the sound of rapping at the entrance door...... I suddenly came to my senses. Frantically pulling a handkerchief from my pocket and wiping my tear-soaked face, I looked up at Dr. Masaki’s face—and froze in shock, my breath catching... It was a demonic visage so terrifying that it instantly shriveled my emotions, which had been soaring to their peak of agitation...... Across his Seto-ware-pale face drained of blood, ghastly sweat glistened and streamed...... His forehead wrinkles pulled taut upward...... Chaotic blue veins squirmed across...... Eyes tightly shut...... Dentures clenched rigidly...... Hands gripping the chair arms with desperate force as his neck, elbows, and knees trembled violently in discordant directions......

......The sound of knock-knock-knock-knock-knock-knocking at the door............ ......I slumped heavily into the swivel chair. I glared at that knocking sound—like a verdict, like a harbinger of hell, like the end of the world, like something touching my heart directly—struggling and fighting like a deaf-mute. ...trying to make out who stood beyond the door yet unable to see through... trying to cry out for help yet having no way to cry out...

Knock knock knock knock knock…. ...And then... Dr. Masaki, in an attempt to suppress the trembling of his entire body, began a monstrous effort while trembling even more fiercely. ...he slightly shifted his body and feebly opened his peach-colored, bloodshot eyes. His gray lips quivering as he turned to respond, but his voice—gurgling with phlegm—rose and fell two or three times before sinking deep into his throat. Before I could process it, he slumped into the chair right before my eyes and let his head drop limply like a corpse.

Knock knock knock... Rap-rap rap-rap... Thud-thud-thud-thud... At that moment, I didn't feel as though I had answered myself. A strange voice, neither bird nor beast, seemed to burst forth from somewhere and resound through the room. At the same moment I felt a tingling sensation run through each individual hair on my head, and before this prickling had even subsided, the entrance door opened halfway. From beside its rattling brass knob emerged a reddish-brown, perfectly round object glinting with a greasy sheen. It was the bald head of the old janitor who had brought the castella earlier.

“Heh heh… Beggin’ yer pardon…” “The tea’s gone cold, I reckon.” “Got a bit late… heh heh… heh…” As he spoke, he placed a brand-new teapot still puffing steam onto the large desk. Then he bent his already bow-curved back even lower, blinking his bleary white-clouded eyes rapidly as he stretched out his wrinkled neck and timidly peered at Dr. Masaki’s face. “Heh heh… Heh heh…” “Got a bit late there, I reckon… Heh…” “Since last night, all the other janitors been off, so’s just me alone since mornin’, I reckon.” “Heh.” “‘Tis truly…”

Before the old janitor had even finished speaking, Dr. Masaki rose unsteadily from his chair with what seemed a final effort of his waning strength. With a corpse-like lifeless expression, he turned to look at me, lips twitching as if to speak while faintly shaking his head—then suddenly tears streamed down both cheeks before he lowered his eyes in a semblance of bowing and let his head droop heavily again. Clutching the edge of the door the janitor had left ajar, he staggered out of the room—stumbling as if about to collapse—until bracing against the entrance pillar, he finally halted on the corridor's wooden floor. Then the door creaking shut behind him with a *gii-gii* groan suddenly slammed with such violence it seemed to shatter—the explosive crash making every glass window in the room resonate to their farthest corners, vibrating, roaring and shuddering like uproarious laughter.

The janitor, who had been looking back to see him off, eventually turned timidly back toward me and looked up at me in astonishment. “The Doctor… seems… unwell somewhere…” I too summoned what could be called my final effort of courage and forced out a laugh that sounded like sobs. “Ha ha ha ha ha. It’s nothing at all. “I just had a little argument... Ended up making the Professor angry.” “You don’t need to worry.” “We’ll make up soon anyway…”

As I spoke, cold droplets scattered down from both armpits. I never knew lying could be this unbearable.

“Ah... I see how 'twas, sir. “In that case, I can rest easy.” “It’s just that I’ve never laid eyes on such an expression from you before, sir… Heh heh… Please do take your ease now…” “With just me alone, I can’t manage things properly... sir.” "The Professor is truly a kind soul." “He may scold something fierce, but he’s truly a kind soul… And since yesterday, there’s been no small matter of concern over at that Liberation Therapy Ward, so with only one janitor left now—what with them twisting their ankle and taking leave and all… It’s a right pity for the Professor… Heh heh… Heh… Please do take your ease now…”

The bald janitor, carrying the cooled teapot, managed to straighten his hunched back with a grunt and toddled out. I watched his retreating figure as though seeing off a demon that had come to devour my soul. As the door clattered shut behind the departing janitor, I slumped again as though remembering something. While exhaling a long, long trembling breath from the depths of my gut, I planted both elbows on the large desk. I covered my face firmly with both palms and pressed my fingertips hard against my two eyeballs. I felt an indescribable fatigue—as if the core of my head had dried out—and simultaneously saw various visions appearing before my tightly pressed eyeballs. Within that, dashing about freely like lightning... ? ... I saw. And then that... ? ...trying desperately to suppress them in my head, frantic...

......the white sand's glitter in the Liberation Therapy Ward......?......

……the paulownia tree at the very center, its every branch clad in dead leaves……?……

......the figure of Kure Ichirou looming beyond......?...... ......the brick wall beyond, on the roof, two enormous chimneys......?...... ......the undulating black sooty smoke spewing forth from above and the blue, blue color of the sky......?......

...the figure of a girl in white patient clothes, weeping prostrate on a white bed...?... ...Dr. Wakabayashi's investigation documents left forgotten and open on the green desktop...?... ...purple-swirling cigar smoke...?... ...Dr. Wakabayashi's strange smile...?... ...the reflection in Dr. Masaki's pince-nez...?... ......?......?......?......?......?......????????........................

……?…………

I shook my head once forcefully. ...As if trying to brush away this invisible, intangible web of causality—woven by those piecing together such fragments to make me eternal academic prey—I moved both hands while keeping my eyes closed.

Against the backdrop of this madman's dark age, the master of the web manipulating its threads to ensnare me was none other than two enormous poisonous spiders lurking within the academic world. They were M, the preeminent mental scientist of the age, and W, the peerless forensic medical scholar... But of the two, how terrifying had been the net M cast over me... I had resisted with every ounce of my strength until that very moment. I had fought by reversing all the blood in my body, wringing out every last drop of cold sweat and hot tears. And though it seemed I had dealt some tremendous blow to drive off that opponent, at that very instant I too had exhausted all my strength. I had lost not only the ability to judge whether my actions were good or evil, but even the energy to move away from this large desk. Mentally and physically, I was exhausted to the point where I no longer knew whether I possessed the courage to rise again.

But... but behind me now lay yet another formidable enemy. That formidable enemy W might well be seeing through this very scene and sneering. They must have spread such a flawless, sturdy net and now lay in wait for me to fall into it. Of course myself—but even Dr. Masaki remained unaware—through some exquisitely crafted, all-encompassing power of great wisdom, they pressed down upon me relentlessly, having drained me of blood, tears, and marrow, preparing to offer me as sacrifice to this academic construct built upon falsehood and defilement. With each passing moment, I felt it approaching from behind—this reality pierced every nerve.

If it meant being grabbed by that pale, enormous, hairy hand, I shouldn't have resisted Dr. Masaki. Though I couldn't explain why, I preferred Dr. Masaki over Dr. Wakabayashi. Even if both were poisonous academic spiders trying to devour me, I couldn't help feeling Dr. Masaki seemed somehow more nostalgically familiar and approachable. Even now, if Dr. Masaki would just return and say one thing... "I was wrong..."

If only he would say that to me, I might joyfully become Dr. Masaki's slave without a second thought, forgetting everything. I might expose Dr. Wakabayashi's underhandedness and publish records showing sympathy for Dr. Masaki. ...Because I didn't want my heart seized by Dr. Wakabayashi's pale hand... But... everything was deathly still. There was no sound of Dr. Masaki returning. ...I could only await my fate. Having lost all strength to fight against that fate...

Oh... What am I to do...

My breathing once again began to constrict my chest.

And then, before long, it trembled and quivered once more, then subsided powerlessly. ...My entire body felt hollow... as if only the depths of my ear canals were pierced by a shrill ringing... “…………………………

………………………… Blacky blacky pitch-black Were someone to eat Totto’s eyeball, Whitey whitey pure white The real eyeball popped out Ponchki ponchki ponchkichi…… Whitey-white eyeballs are so cute Popping out from someone’s mouth Slipping off the tip of chopsticks Rolling rolling rolling rolling away Rolled away somewhere and disappeared Ah Raa raa raa raa ponchkichi…… Whitey-white eyeballs are so cute Totto’s eyeballs are so cute

The real eyeball is so cute Cute cute cute they're O—— Raa raa raa raa ponchkichi…… Ponchki ponchki ponchkichi…… Cute yo—— Cute yo—— …………………………”

The aforementioned dancing-mad girl’s crystal-clear voice leaked through the southern glass window…….

...Suddenly...a single brilliant idea flashed through my mind. I felt as though the countless... ? ... that had been stubbornly clinging to the center of my head all flared up and vanished at once. Like a mechanical doll, I removed my hands from my face and righted myself on the swivel chair. I looked at the door through which Dr. Masaki had exited. I looked at the two gold and black frames hanging on the front wall. I surveyed the various documents scattered before my eyes. I saw how the late morning light nearing autumn noon, filtering through bluish-white cigar smoke that filled every corner of the room, cast sharp reflections on each individual object.

"...Whaaaat... Whaaaat's this nooow... "...This... Ah-hahahahahahahahaha..." I kept laughing, pressing down with both hands over and over as unbearable hilarity surged up from both my sides.

Idiot idiot idiot idiot idiot... I was the biggest idiot of all, Santaro the supreme fool! Ah-hahahahahaha... ...Dr. Wakabayashi too, Dr. Masaki too—they're the same. No—they're even bigger idiots than me—thoroughgoing, elaborate fools. All three of us were caught in an outrageous mutual misunderstanding. What an utterly ridiculous mistake... this was... ...Who killed Chiyoko? Who gave Kure Ichirou the illustrated scroll?...Who is Kure Ichirou's true parent? W or M...or is there yet another person waiting in the wings?...Not a single one of these mysteries had been solved in the slightest. All of this might be the haphazard work of some third party...

...No, no... There must have been no criminal involved in this case from the very beginning. The content of this incident was nothing more than viewing through overlapping—various unexplained incidents that had occurred separately by chance. Whether it was Chiyoko's hanging death... Dr.Saito's drowning death... or Kure Ichirou's madness outbreak... they might all have been matters each initiated of their own accord... Otherwise, how could such a mystical, inexplicable, bottomless incident possibly exist?

……The two doctors were misunderstanding this and trying to forcibly overlay these incidents into a single sheet to create one focal point. They feared each other... each trying to prevent their precious research materials from being taken by the other—and because they glared through their tinted lenses of bias—everything merely appeared as if each had single-handedly done it all.

...How pitiful... Each being too acutely aware of their own guilt... No... No... Those two peerless brains—comrades who until now had never found a worthy rival—had here discovered ideal opponents in each other, instinctively unleashing their combative urges. They locked in a four-limbed grapple, rendered immobile. Ah... ah... Could such an idiotic... absurd... preposterous conflict ever exist again in this world? The two doctors' research and struggle were far more earnest, profound, and dreadful than the incident's actual content. Perhaps all scholars are just earnestly bickering over such trivial nonsense...

...However, considering it now, it was hardly unreasonable. That Kure Ichirou and I resembled each other so much you'd think we were twins no matter how you looked at it. Moreover, that Kure Moyoko and this corpse beauty image in the illustrated scroll weren't merely lookalikes. They were exact duplicates... Anyone would surely have been astonished to discover such an improbable double coincidence congregating within this region—nay, within the same bloodline. And thinking there must be some profound cause behind this, they would have begun their research from the very start through tinted lenses...... Even if they themselves had had no such intention, their mindset upon commencing the research was already equivalent to wearing those lenses—there had been no helping it. As evidence, if we separated each of the various incidents constituting this case one by one, weren't they all events that could have occurred independently and freely according to their own nature—without requiring either doctor's involvement? This was merely due to the two doctors suspecting each other's handiwork and mutually distrusting—making separate events appear overlapped—and without their elaborate explanations, it would have been nothing more than a simple collection of two unnatural deaths and one madness outbreak......

......That's it......that's it...... That must be it...... That must be it...... All of it was nothing more than baseless incidents colliding with each other...... I hadn't noticed that...... And there I was......groaning and being tormented......Idiot......idiot......idiot...... Idiots—idiots—a whole gathering of utter fools......All three of us...... ......If I'm not careful......I might end up being the culprit in this case after all......

“...Ah-hahahahahahaha...”

When I heard my own laughter echoing through the room, I abruptly clamped my mouth shut. And then I noticed that my eyes—which had at some point come to rest as I propped my cheek on my hand—were now irresistibly drawn to the illustrated scroll lying on the green surface before my nose.

……Is this what they call spiritual insight…….

...I suddenly started and sat up straight once more in the swivel chair. Filled with an unprecedented... indescribably sacred feeling, I reverently picked up the illustrated scroll and stared fixedly at it as I pondered.

...The final remnant was this illustrated scroll's supernatural power... All else could be denied... Yet this scroll's power alone defied denial until the bitter end... and... ...When viewed superficially, the entire incident could be called nonsense through and through. It might indeed be considered nothing but a trivial collection of minor events; however, through Drs. Masaki and Wakabayashi's mutual entanglement as they attempted to execute some bizarre enterprise centered on the scroll's supernatural power, the whole affair appeared to take on an intensely meaningful, shudder-inducing tension—yet stepping back to observe the incident from its reverse side revealed both doctors being driven about by this very scroll. They cast aside all wisdom, courage, scholarship, status, honor—even life itself—to prostrate themselves in worship before its supernatural power. As for other people's lives, transmigrations, and anguish—if Dr. Masaki's account held truth—these too undoubtedly stemmed from scroll-induced incidents. Thus ultimately, the central mystical force governing all unfathomable phenomena manifested from this single illustrated scroll. Even were every factual reality and scientific explanation reduced to nonsense, this scroll's supernatural power alone would absolutely resist such nullification by any means...

...Therefore...if this illustrated scroll indeed harbored a spirit, it must know everything. At the same time, it must know my own history better than any living soul...How exactly had I become entangled in this case? It must know—down to the last grain—every precise step by which it fell into Kure Ichirou's hands. Moreover, it must grasp in full the hidden machinations through which it torments both doctors while afflicting even me.

This single illustrated scroll had driven multitudes to madness, led them astray, and made them slaughter one another—all while feigning ignorance through the ages. In the same manner, even now at this very moment, it lay in my palm pretending complete obliviousness... yet... however... ...Over a thousand years past, the debauchery of Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty—mirrored in young scholar Wu Qingxiu's fanatical devotion—had manifested six decaying beauties within this scroll's confines. ...Yet the monomaniacal will of that uncanny artist—imbued within these grotesque images—would entwine itself with the Wu bloodline even after crossing to Japan, painting terrifying karmic tableaus across generations without end. Moreover, having traversed twelve centuries to reach this modern era—passing into the hands of Drs. Masaki and Wakabayashi who shared no familial ties—even when exposed to science's supreme illumination, far from diminishing its eldritch power, it had instead multiplied its baleful influence manifold, trampling every aspect of both scholars' lives into mockery. Nor did it stop there—here and now, in the very heart of Kyushu Imperial University that citadel of modern culture, in broad daylight—the instant my fingertips brushed its surface, that invisible demonic claw already crushed my heart with such force that fresh blood and cold sweat poured forth... binding me through inscrutable karma... drawing me into destiny's unfathomable vortex. Was it not blowing obscuring mists across truth's face while torturing me through that haze's perverse allure? Forcing me to recall the unrememberable... contemplate the inconceivable... strain to see the invisible? Compelling me to chase vanished memories... ponder another's life... hunt truth in non-events—all while confounding... maddening... wringing tears and laughter alike? Was it not thrashing me through a madhouse inferno surpassing madness itself...?

……Oh…… What a terrifying supernatural power……. As I stared into the space before my eyes, having thought this far—within the great void at the depths of my widely opened eyes—the phantom of Lady Dai’s cold smile on the fiftieth day after her death appeared vividly once more. I glared at it with wide eyes until it vanished. Damn... Just watch what I do...

As I thought this, I—struck by a premonition that I might discover some terrifying secret key within this illustrated scroll capable of shattering all mystery and incomprehension at once—bit down hard on my lips. Filled with a spiritual insight that something capable of exposing in one strike the true nature of the demonic power tormenting both doctors and myself—something utterly unexpected still remaining undetected—might be lurking somewhere within this scroll, I swiftly untied its string. When I incidentally checked my wristwatch, it showed exactly ten minutes to twelve. The electric clock on the wall indicated eleven minutes before the hour, its long hand perhaps already poised to jump toward the X mark.

When I breathed on the green stone forming the scroll's axis, overlapping fingerprints of indeterminate origin seemed visible; realizing these were traces from when I had fiddled with it earlier, I picked up the scroll again with a wry smile. "This half-hearted approach won't do..." I coldly reproached myself... On both the mounting embroidery and deep blue paper within, countless thin, glimmering fibrous strands clung to the surface—likely remnants from when this illustrated scroll had been wrapped in silk floss or similar material long ago. When I pressed it to my nose and inhaled, amidst the musty odor mingled with a faint camphor-like fragrance, there seemed to emerge an elusive refined scent—but when I steadied myself and sniffed again with full concentration, I realized it was undoubtedly a delicate perfume-like aroma, so faint it seemed I might be the first to detect it.

...Interesting. If I continued at this rate, I might still discover various things. The fact that this musty odor and camphor-like woody fragrance had permeated within Miroku-sama's wooden statue would occur to anyone, but no one had likely noticed this perfume-like scent. And what else could this exquisite fragrance be but an intimation of this illustrated scroll's former owner? ...Got it. If there remained even one unnoticed thing here... whether a single strand of hair or a speck of tobacco ash... it would become crucial evidence to determine the culprit...

...Thinking myself practically transformed into a master detective, I grew increasingly fervent as I rolled the illustrated scroll backward from its top end. Meticulously examining both front and back surfaces from the painted section through to where the origin account's text concluded, I found myself no small measure astonished—the decaying images of the deathly beauties I couldn't bring myself to properly behold earlier now appeared as nothing more than dispassionate arrangements of pigment. And yet, it was by no means a matter of lighting or anything else. From Lady Dai’s decayed and tattered lips through which her beautifully aligned teeth showed clearly, to the viscera smoothly swollen and gleaming as they enveloped gas—I examined these details meticulously, but no matter how long I stared at what was clearly nothing, it remained nothing. I had completely lost the will to contend with the absurdity of human neural processes.

...However... thinking this and looking even more carefully, I noticed that while the paper's base at the beginning was somewhat blurred, the closer one moved toward the end of the origin story, the smoother and more polished its surface became. This was only natural, for even Wu Qingxiu—who first took up the brush—would inevitably have opened and unrolled the scroll more frequently toward its beginning. Moreover, subsequent generations of the Kure family who opened this illustrated scroll did likewise—just as I had done initially—examining with particular care those sections nearer the beginning that retained more complete forms, which from human nature's perspective was unavoidable...... The scroll's entire reverse side appeared coated with some glittering pale brown liquid upon which white circular marks resembling fingerprints clung here and there, yet beneath this unevenly textured paper, coarse fabric patterns emerged irregularly from below, making it difficult to clearly discern what manner of traces these might be. ...In the end, what I discovered from this illustrated scroll was nothing but that elegant perfume-like aroma from earlier.

Once more I brought my face close to the illustrated scroll, repeatedly inhaling deep into my gut this faint, ever so faint fragrance whispering something to me... yet... whatever perfume this might be called—not only did it strike me as truly refined, a fragrance pure unto itself—but from memory's deepest depths it evoked something nostalgic yet unreachable like a dream... to speak honestly, a scent that stirred feelings resembling memories I longed to inhale. Needless to say, it seemed feminine—but without such vivid clarity that I could determine whether it belonged to a past lover, mother, or sister... Just to be thorough, I stood up, retrieved my student cap from beside the entrance door, and compared its interior scent with the scroll's fragrance. But no matter how much I sniffed the hat's lining, there was only new felt's odor, patent leather's sheen, and faint mildew. It proved neither evidence nor reference that I'd ever used this scroll's perfume.

I let out a faint sigh as I set my hat aside and tried to re-roll the illustrated scroll, but... twitched... and stopped my hands. Involuntarily staring into empty space... ...for a truly unexpected revelation had flashed through my mind... ...for I had fleetingly begun to grasp the true meaning behind that uncanny fact—that when Tokura Sengoro, the Kure family's elderly farmhand, discovered Kure Ichirou at the Meinohama stone quarry, Ichirou had apparently been staring exclusively at the white sections of the illustrated scroll...

......That was precisely why......

It was perfectly clear that even within this illustrated scroll, the section containing the Chinese origin account at its end must have been frequently unfurled and rolled by human hands. Therefore, across its nearly ten-foot length, there should logically exist places where something from those who peered at this illustrated scroll might have fallen and become lodged... However, simultaneously considering that if even one person among thousands were to unroll and examine beyond these sections of blank white paper all the way to its furthest end, such a person would require a mind extraordinarily different from ordinary people's—indeed, common sense would immediately tell us such individuals were virtually nonexistent. And yet... what if—against all common sense—there actually appeared either some unimaginable circumstance, or someone with a fundamentally different mental structure who had unrolled and examined all the way to the very end of these blank sections following the origin account? What then? In short, could it be that Wu Qingxiu—creator of this illustrated scroll—calmly and composedly depicted only Lady Dai’s skeletal remains at the very end? ...Could it be that everyone from Lady Dai's sister Fenko through generations of the Kure family to Dr.Masaki himself had simply—guided by common sense—casually settled on there being only six death figures depicted within this scroll? And furthermore, if among them only someone perceptive enough to discern this illustrated scroll’s supernatural power—so potent as to drive people mad—were to go to such lengths to unroll and examine it... what might they find? If such a scenario were possible, how could one possibly claim nothing lay embedded there? Moreover, whatever had become embedded there—no matter how minute—wouldn’t it come to express an extremely significant meaning? Using this illustrated scroll, might we not precisely pinpoint the true identity of the culprit who set this incident in motion? No. Perhaps they might be someone possessing the power to shatter this illustrated scroll's mystical force in one stroke, returning all confusion to truth...... How could anyone claim nothing was discovered from this scroll without having investigated at least to that extent?

...Kure Ichirou had been intently staring at the white sections of this illustrated scroll at the Meinohama stone quarry. Moreover, given that he was already presumed to be half Wu Qingxiu and half Kure Ichirou in mentality at that time, it remained unclear which persona's mindset had driven his actions—yet regardless, we could reasonably infer he must have examined the scroll's white sections all the way to their very end...and there had undoubtedly discovered something embedded within.

...As evidence, wasn't Kure Ichirou telling Grandpa Sengoro, "I know the true identity of this scroll's custodian"...? How... How had I failed to notice this fact until now... As these thoughts flashed through my mind, I again felt pursued by some unseen force and glanced between my wristwatch and the electric clock. Both showed four minutes before twelve.

My hands reflexively readjusted their grip on the illustrated scroll and began unrolling its white sections. And so for that first minute or so, I had intended to examine as calmly as possible, but realizing it was perfectly clear that no matter how far I progressed, I would have to keep staring at nothing but pure white Chinese paper, I soon began to feel both irritation and absurdity—as if being made to traverse an endless white desert alone, without any purpose. Seeing through my own heart that was putting on airs of being a great detective all by myself, I suddenly felt a sense of disgust. After painstakingly managing to advance about three feet, I was already completely fed up.

Along with that—whether related or not remained unclear—my earlier conjecture that Wu Qingxiu might have drawn a skeletal figure at the very end grew increasingly dubious. If Wu Qingxiu had descended into dementia, it would have occurred after that instant when—through his sister-in-law Fenko's explanation—he clearly realized he'd been history's greatest fool, having pointlessly sacrificed his beloved wife through this futile display of loyalty... This meant he must have remained sane until minutes or even seconds prior—therefore Fenko would surely have mentioned whether he'd drawn the skeletal figure at the end unless she deliberately omitted it. Moreover, applying this logic to Fenko herself—there wasn't one chance in ten thousand that she, while unrolling this magnum opus created by her beloved through her own sister's sacrifice, could have overlooked something even a complete stranger like me might notice a millennium later... Thinking this, I became utterly deflated and drained of all resolve.

...Yet... Even so, I—while simultaneously feeling both a trifling inertia-like sensation of obligation imposed upon my drained sense of duty and a drowsiness creeping over me as all accumulated mental exhaustion surged forth at once—continued unfurling with both hands what remained of the white section (perhaps about ten feet left) in one motion, chasing after it with my eyes as if making a mere token gesture. And when I finally pursued the white section of this lengthy scroll—seeming some twenty or thirty feet long—to its very end, a black stain-like mark unexpectedly flickered into view, making me jolt and widen my eyes in surprise.

Upon closer inspection, it was five lines of delicate, refined feminine handwriting written about an inch away from where golden pigment ripples had been painted on the navy-blue paper at the very end. Could this be what they call the Ono Ga-dō style... May even the darkness of this mother's yearning heart be illuminated As the world opens wide, wisdom's light alone shines bright. November 26, Meiji 40 (1907) In Fukuoka, Mother of Masaki Ichirou, Chiyoko To Dr. Masaki Keishi ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………All my hair stood on end…….

……I frantically tried to re-roll the illustrated scroll……but my trembling hands dropped it……. ...And as I watched this scroll unfurl itself like a living creature—spilling from the large desk to crawl across the floor, coiling over the linoleum in endless spirals—a visceral shudder seized me, plunging me into panic. Unaware of how I'd opened the door or when I'd begun sprinting down the corridor, I hurtled down the stairs and exploded through the entrance.

A tremendous roar resounded through the pine grove of Kyushu Imperial University's campus, as if to scatter me. That was the noon cannon.

It could only be seen as a miracle... or rather, some invisible great force reaching down from the heavens to drag me about at its whim. It was such an uncanny series of events.

After bursting out through Kyushu Imperial University Faculty of Medicine's main gate, I had absolutely no memory of where or how I wandered. And I had absolutely no idea what goal had brought me back to the Kyushu Imperial University Department of Psychiatry professor's office. I heard a car horn screaming from behind. I was startled by the roar of a tram screeching to a halt before my eyes. I was chased away by bicycle bells. I heard voices shouting rebukes and dogs barking ferociously. I saw the sun spinning wildly, winds swirling from all directions, and dust clashing like warring forces. I saw a utility pole dangling from the clouds. I saw a painted sign dripping fresh blood down to the eaves. I gazed at a vast plain stretching beyond the horizon to transparent mountains. I wandered into an unknowable accumulation of red bricks—thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of millions. In those purple shadows, I saw the phantom of an infant writhing and thrashing its limbs. I looked up at a yellow-glinting airplane traversing the clear blue sky's center... then saw six corpse-like beauties' nude statues—mere white outlines—gliding past in orderly formation.

Clouds shaped like human heads... or eyes... noses... lips... each trailing tails in white... black... yellow... streaming through gaps of blue, blue sky stretched bitter-clear like medicinal fluid between them... Under this dome, I tore at and tousled my hair—encasing razor-sharp nerves and entangled emotions sparking wildly—while feeling stabbing pains shooting through my forehead... while rubbing and rubbing eyes stinging from glare and grit... staggering onward without knowing where... reeling recklessly forward.

...A river...a bridge...railway tracks...a red torii gate...and flanking that crimson torii gate, the figures of Dr. Masaki and Dr. Wakabayashi standing with pallid faces...until finally, forcing myself to keep walking while repeatedly suppressing the urge to break into a run. ……Everything was true…… It was neither falsified academic research nor fabricated confession. Moreover, from beginning to end, every single thing had been planned and executed by Dr. Masaki alone.

……Dr. Wakabayashi was nothing at all……. ……Dr. Wakabayashi had been unwittingly used as a pawn in Dr. Masaki’s research from the very beginning. …Fascinated by the elaborately bizarre crimes committed by Dr. Masaki, he had unwittingly ended up being made to take on the role of gathering materials for Dr. Masaki’s research publications while voluntarily investigating them himself. He had been beautifully caught in the hoof trap Dr. Masaki had set, thoroughly led around by the nose…….

...However, as his conclusion, Dr. Wakabayashi discovered Chiyoko's handwriting left at the very end of that illustrated scroll. He must have discovered the sole point that should form the focal point of all accumulated final doubts and been shocked just like I was. And just like me, he must have resolved everything in an instant. He must have discovered that everything was Dr. Masaki's doing. ...Yet how noble was the attitude Dr. Wakabayashi adopted there... Having thus penetrated to the deepest core of the incident's truth, Dr. Wakabayashi simultaneously resolved—both as a fellow alumnus and townsman, and as a scholar—to extend the utmost possible sympathy and respect to Dr. Masaki. He obscured only the key points of the incident’s content. [He] handed over the authentic investigation records to Dr. Masaki himself, entrusting him with complete freedom to burn or discard them as he pleased…… Or alternatively, [he] deliberately had tea sweets sent over, making known through unspoken gestures the sentiment: “I remain distanced and withdrawn, so please speak freely without concern.”

“……Dr. Masaki committed suicide a month ago.” That spur-of-the-moment lie he uttered—something like “Dr. Masaki committed suicide a month ago”—must have also sprung from that same well-meaning intent: to ensure Dr. Masaki, who was eavesdropping, wouldn’t appear in that scene… to prevent him from falling into such an excruciating predicament… or rather, to guard against plunging my recovering mind back into irreparable chaos… He must have said it fully prepared for the lie to be exposed later…

……Dr. Wakabayashi had maintained a truly masculine, noble, impeccable gentlemanly demeanor.

……Yet in stark contrast to this, Dr. Masaki had sacrificed his entire life and soul for this experiment. From the very beginning, he alone had taken interest in this legend, deceived Chiyoko into bearing a child, and made her provide the illustrated scroll. And he had carried out this plan without regard for anything. ...Yet when Chiyoko provided that illustrated scroll, Dr. Masaki had never dreamed she had written down—in the colophon alongside the father’s name—that waka poem, the date, the child’s name and birthplace, leaving a pointed message pregnant with meaning. He could not have imagined even remotely that her maternal love—of such wretched profundity—and the workings of her sorrowful mind, which should be regarded as a splendid crystallization of intellect, had extended so thoroughly to that point. He could not have conceived that at the core of that bold, dazzling, utterly genius enterprise plan lay a single fatal oversight. ……All while trampling upon gods and buddhas, blood and tears with scorn—believing it was for academia’s sake, for humanity’s sake—he remained tormented day and night by pursuing lashes of conscience and poignant human compassion……thrashing about with a corpse’s heart clutched in his grasp.

......This was Dr. Masaki's entire life. Utterly defiled while simultaneously being utterly purified... Utterly sorrowful and utterly exhilarating... ...And at the very moment Dr. Masaki's cursed research entered its final stage, even he—when viewing the investigation documents cast to him by Dr. Wakabayashi—found his courage chilled at last. He realized his opponent's terrifyingly penetrating intellect had surrounded him through extremely circuitous means... leaving not a single gap of even one-tenth of a millimeter. Thus unable to endure the agony of being trapped within this fearsome web of insight, he attempted a counterattack through utterly cowardly yet thoroughly ironic and cunning methods. Using me—a third party chosen from among his own patients—to execute an extremely perilous disclosure, he laid bare everything before me.

...But...that confession from beginning to end was something he alone had planned and executed entirely by himself—a division of solitary acts between two personas. This idea reached unprecedented levels of ingenious refinement through his unique wit that skillfully incorporated depictions of the other party's nature and actions...yet to precisely equal measure, it remained an utterly shallow and childish notion. ...The extraordinary quality of this dual-role scheme that cut through his self-imposed binds...the boldness and cunning in differentiating between M and W...and yet that very same wretchedness...that foolishness...of tumbling back into old self-created snares...

“...Danger...!” “You idiot...!” “Ah—!” The shouts and screams came crashing down in overlapping waves from immediately behind me. At the same time, ...Clatter clatter clatter clatter...Clang clang...Bang...Crack... A violent crashing sound erupted beneath my feet in quick succession. I whirled around to find everyone standing nearby glaring at my face. ...Directly behind me sat a blue-painted massive freight truck facing away... A V-shaped bicycle and a cluster of pitifully shattered empty bottles lay scattered beneath my feet, tea-brown soy sauce oozing sluggishly across the ground. ...A large man in pale yellow work clothes jumped down from the vehicle, reaching into the shadow of the tire as he dragged out an apprentice in a marked happi coat—paper-pale from blood loss—into the blinding sunlight... People rushed toward the scene...

I began walking briskly while continuing to think. So terrifying... A secret too horrifying to fully comprehend. The struggle between Wu Qingxiu's malevolent ghost—dead these thousand years—and Dr. Masaki's modern scientific knowledge now raged at its fiercest. Yet from the very moment Dr. Masaki embarked on this research, Wu Qingxiu's specter had seized the vital core of his conscience. Within human love itself, even the greatest parent-child bonds and marital affections had been strangled to death. All while remaining utterly blind to this within himself, persisting in his resolve never to succumb to Wu Qingxiu's curse no matter what... He had given form to this accursed psychological state through papers, lectures, and chongare ballads, publishing them one after another... Even as he produced an endless chain of tragic victims beginning with Chiyoko—Kure Ichirou, Moyoko, Yashiroko—he courageously trampled over them again and again, certain of science's triumph... Turning to confront Wu Qingxiu's ghost, he slashed and cut with single-minded fury. What a gruesome, cold-blooded, viciously tenacious struggle! As if I could smell blood and sweat dripping from souls themselves...

……But……. ……But……. When I had thought this far, I came to an abrupt stop. ...I saw the bustling thoroughfare.... I looked around at the people turning back to glance at me with curious eyes and expressions. I looked up at the swirling vortex of light that had begun spinning round and round at the summit of a tall, tall advertising tower. I stared at the sunset clouds lying atop it, like fresh meat.

……But…….

……But…… ……When I properly considered it, I realized I still hadn’t recalled even a single fragment of my past memories from within all that—I couldn’t provide myself with an answer to the question: What am I? I remained in a pitiful state of amnesia. I remained completely unchanged from when I opened my eyes this morning in Room 7... Still just a solitary speck drifting through the cosmos—sad, lonely, and utterly nameless.

……What am I?……. ……Ah... Though recalling this would likely free me from Wu Qingxiu's curse... Though it feels I could sever myself from that illustrated scroll's malevolent power... I simply cannot remember it. No matter how much I thought, this alone remained as the final, sole question…. ……Who am I……Who am I……What manner of causal relationship binds my past to this incident…….

...Thinking this way, I repeated today's memories; repeating them, I reconsidered again and again—all while walking under dark clouds that made me alternately quicken and slacken my pace. ...The ringing of fire-alarm bells near and far...the groan of automobile pumps...children's cries, the clatter of weaving looms...the blare of factory whistles somewhere... These sounds reached my ears one after another as I unconsciously turned right and left—until suddenly I kicked the earth and stopped dead. I froze rigid, pulling my neck in as if about to faint from the shock.

...This is bad. I left that illustrated scroll exactly as it was. ...Chiyoko's handwriting at the end of that scroll mustn't be seen by anyone... ...If Dr. Masaki sees it, he might go mad... He might truly kill himself... ......God... This is catastrophic...... I involuntarily leapt up. And in the next instant, I had spun around and was sprinting straight down an unfamiliar pitch-dark country road. Soon I came running into a bright, beautiful street...

Before long, I passed through a dark, cluttered alley... I dashed through a dazzling street where shamisen and taiko drums sounded... I reached a dead end at the breakwater lined with electric lights jutting into open sea on three sides and, startled, turned back...

Goods from various shops, trams, automobiles, and crowds of people slid backward one after another like a spinning lantern... Rubbing my eyes blurred with sweat and tears, I hurried back the way I had come, back the way I had come... My vision swam, my breath came in gasps, and the surroundings seemed to brighten and darken intermittently. I felt as if countless gray birds were swirling before my eyes only to vanish.

...Before I knew it, I had collapsed in the street—I think someone helped me up. And I think I shook them off and started running again. As I kept repeating such actions, I finally lost all understanding of everything. What am I running for? I had stopped even attempting to consider which direction to head. The things I sometimes saw or heard felt like half-dreams, but in the end I staggered along in a trance until even those half-dreams faded... or so I think.

I don’t know how many hours or days have passed….

When a sudden shudder ran through my entire body and I came to my senses, I found myself back in the Kyushu Imperial University Department of Psychiatry professor's office without knowing when I'd returned. There I sat in the same swivel chair as before, slumped over the green baize-covered desk with both hands flung out before me. For a moment, I suspected I might have been dreaming. Earlier... From when I fled this room around noon until now—the various events I saw and heard while wandering about, the many strange things I pondered... or the unbearable fear and suffocation I felt during that time—I began to suspect whether all of it had been a dream seen while unconscious here like this. And with an eerie, eerie feeling, I looked all around my surroundings.

My clothes, my shirt, even the shoes I'm wearing—all are caked in sweat and dust, turned completely white. Both elbows and knees are either torn wide open or caked in mud, about two buttons have been ripped off, and the collar dangles down from my right shoulder—presenting a figure that looks exactly like some crossbreed between a drunkard and a beggar. On the back of my left hand, jet-black blood has clotted—where could I have injured myself? No particular pain or itch anywhere... But my eyes and mouth seem full of sand and dust—the unpleasantness of stinging eyelids and grating between teeth......

Leaning over the desk once more with my stinging eyes and grit-filled mouth, I tried motionlessly to trace back my steps—but no matter how I thought, I couldn't recall why I'd returned here at all. Staring at the new square cap I'd left behind on the desk's edge, I strained to recall—to recall—the mindset I'd had then, but now of all times, my associative faculties proved mysteriously feeble… Had I perhaps left some critically important item in this room and returned to retrieve it?… Muttering this to myself, I slowly raised my head to look around—front, back, left, right—only to find a large incandescent bulb blazing brilliantly above me.

The entrance door remained half-open. However, the documents on the large desk—whoever had tidied them—were neatly arranged exactly as before. When I entered this morning with Dr. Wakabayashi and saw them for the first time, their arrangement didn’t differ by a single iota… They showed not a trace of having been disturbed. Beside them sat the red Daruma ashtray, still facing the same direction as when I first saw it this morning, continuing its eternal yawn.

Of all these, only the document bundle sandwiched in canvas-backed cardboard containing "The Madman's Dark Age" Chongare Songs and "Fetal Dreams" thesis papers showed clear signs of recent handling upon closer inspection—the papers slightly askew in an X-shaped overlap as if carelessly discarded. Yet the other item, the blue merino cloth bundle that Dr. Masaki had undoubtedly dusted off before my very eyes this morning, remained exactly as first seen: blanketed in a uniform layer of fine gray particles testifying to its prolonged neglect by human hands. On top of that, neither were there any signs of tea having been drunk on the large desk, nor any traces of food having been eaten. Just to be thorough, I peered into the red Daruma ashtray—inside, not a single speck of cigar ash remained—and there it continued its gaping yawn unchanged, glaring up at me with golden and black eyes.

How strange… I wonder if most of this morning’s events were a dream… I definitely saw the contents of that cloth-wrapped bundle… But there’s no way so much dust could accumulate in such a short time… I slowly stood up. My knees dangled unnervingly, threatening to give way, but I barely managed to support them by pressing both hands against the edge of the large desk before forcing my cotton-soft body upright. With fingers trembling uncontrollably, I grabbed the merino cloth bundle and pulled it toward me, leaving behind a square dust outline that remained clearly visible. I examined the dust stripes settled into the knot once more, but no matter how I considered it, there was no trace of recent human contact. And as I untied that knot, the white streaks of dust vanished without a trace.

I was dumbfounded. While staring fixedly at the space before me, I retraced in my mind the memories from that morning. Yet the memory of Dr. Masaki showing me this bundle's contents and giving that terrifying explanation could never coexist with the reality of this knot's white dust—they were undeniably two contradictory facts. Two precisely contradictory events. Clenching the sense of foreboding coursing through my body between my molars, I spread open the blue merino-cloth bundle with my convulsing fingers. From within emerged the newspaper-wrapped package I had seen earlier and Dr. Wakabayashi's original investigative documents, stacked in precisely the same configuration I'd recently observed. Not only that—the fine dust sifted through the merino cloth now coated the black cardboard cover of those documents in a thin layer, and removing the newspaper-wrapped scroll left yet another rectangular outline starkly visible.

I was dumbfounded once more. Overwhelmed by such strangeness to the point of feeling like a fox had bewitched me, yet driven by a need to verify my own sanity, I began slowly unwrapping the newspaper covering the illustrated scroll. I meticulously examined every detail—the newspaper's folding creases, the box lid's fit, how the scroll had been rolled, even the string's fastening method. Everything appeared immaculately preserved by remarkably meticulous hands—no doubly folded sections, not a single distorted crease anywhere. When I unrolled the scroll completely, a white powder—likely insect repellent—scattered across the desk, glistening as it fell while releasing a pungent aromatic odor. The next set of investigative documents I opened was similarly devoid of insect repellent, but as I briskly flipped through the pages, a dusty odor faintly assailed my nostrils. In any case, it was certain they had not been touched by human hands recently.

I then opened Dr. Masaki’s will bound with foolscap to be thorough. When I flipped through the last two or three pages again, what had until this morning appeared as fresh bluish pen traces with barely dry ink now looked completely jet-black, with what seemed like yellow mold growing between the lines. No matter how I examined it, there was no way this could have been written just two or three days prior. Drawn deeper into mystery after mystery, I tried lifting out the investigative documents from the cloth bundle exactly as Dr. Masaki had done earlier. To my shock, I discovered beneath them a single yellowed newspaper extra serving as an underlay. This had definitely not been present when Dr. Masaki unwrapped this cloth bundle before.

I looked around wildly. I could only think that somewhere in this room, an invisible magician was performing tricks. Or perhaps my mind had become disordered again—the thought looped through my head—as I wondered if I was falling into some hallucination. Trembling, I picked up that newspaper extra to examine it. When I read the headline printed in preposterously large type across the top right of the single-page sheet folded into eight sections, I involuntarily cried out "Ah!" I staggered backward, catching myself on the swivel chair to avoid collapsing.

This was published by Fukuoka City's Nishikai Shimbun on October 20, 1926—the day after Dr. Saito's death anniversary as shown by the calendar on the front wall, the very day Dr. Wakabayashi stated Dr. Masaki had committed suicide—bearing on the page's left margin a roughly five-by-four-sun halftone print of Dr. Masaki's laughing face, his pince-nez glinting and dentures starkly bared in coarsely grained photographic reproduction. Kyushu Imperial University Professor of Psychiatry

Dr. Masaki Commits Suicide by Drowning Simultaneously, a rare massacre incident that erupted within the Liberation Therapy Ward for the Insane is exposed. Around 5 PM on the 20th, when the drowned corpse of Kyushu Imperial University Professor of Psychiatry, Junior Sixth Rank, Medical Doctor Masaki Keishi was discovered washed ashore on the coast near Umadaibama Beach behind the university's medical department, close to the aquarium, the university grounds plunged into extreme commotion. Amidst this turmoil, an incident unexpectedly came to light: at approximately noon on the previous day, the 19th, within Dr. Masaki's uniquely conceived "Liberation Therapy Ward for the Insane" under the Psychiatry Department, a deranged youth had brutally murdered a deranged girl. Subsequently, this youth inflicted instant death or mortal/lesser injuries upon several other patients present in the ward, even severely wounding a caretaker who attempted intervention. Both university authorities and judicial officials found themselves at a loss regarding appropriate measures, currently conducting rigorous investigations under utmost secrecy.

The deranged youth wielded a hoe Five men and women killed and injured Liberation Therapy Ward: A Scene of Bloodshed!!! On the previous day, Tuesday the 19th, around noon when the incident erupted, Dr. Masaki—then serving as the department's supervising professor—had been napping in his office within said department. Meanwhile, inside the Liberation Therapy Ward, ten patients roamed about as usual, each performing their individual acts of madness. At that moment, Adachi Gisaku (pseudonym, 60)—who had been cultivating a field in one corner—heard both the noon cannon and a nurse announcing lunch. He discarded his hoe and departed for the ward building. Seemingly having observed Gisaku's movements beforehand, the deranged youth Kure Ichirou (20)—adopted son and nephew of Kure Yashiro, agriculturalist of 1586 Meinohama Town, Sawara District, Fukuoka Prefecture—suddenly seized the abandoned hoe. He then brutally bludgeoned the occipital region of Asada Shino (pseudonym, 17), a deranged girl planting vegetation nearby, leaving her lifeless in a spray of blood before she could utter a sound. Kamakura Tōta—the Liberation Therapy Ward's caretaker and a fourth-degree judo practitioner who witnessed this—immediately called for help while rushing into the grounds, but it was already too late. The two patients present in the ward—one with political mania and another with religious fervor—had closed in on Kure Ichirou to rescue Shino. In the blink of an eye, the former had his cheek slashed and the latter his forehead struck by the edge of Kure Ichirou's hoe, both collapsing onto the sand stained crimson. At this moment, Kamakura—having found an opening—attempted to grapple Ichirou from behind and subdue him in one motion. However, Ichirou's resistance proved unexpectedly fierce; discarding the hoe, he seized both of Kamakura's arms and began swinging the caretaker's 75-kilogram body vertically and horizontally like a waterwheel to break free. Even the stalwart Kamakura grew desperate, struggling not to be thrown off when Ichirou accidentally stepped one foot into a pitfall dug by a madwoman. In that instant, Kamakura's shoulder slipped loose and they collapsed together—before he could recover his stance, his ribs struck the foundation stones beneath the main building's eaves, plunging him into unconsciousness. At this moment, several male nurses, janitors, and medical staff who had heard Kamakura's cries rushed to the entrance of the Liberation Therapy Ward—among them were those versed in judo—but when Kure Ichirou, having stepped back into the center of the grounds and retrieved his dropped hoe, stood pale-faced and spattered with blood while glaring around at his surroundings and shouting "You dare interfere with my work?!", they found themselves overwhelmed by his ferocity, not a single one able to enter. During this interval, Kure Ichirou—having shifted his gaze to a corner of the grounds—saw his complexion abruptly normalize as he began smiling cheerfully. Gripping the blood-soaked hoe anew, he advanced upon two women standing there. First cornering a certain dance-crazed girl at the field's edge, he smashed her forehead to pieces. Then approaching the middle-aged woman who had been calmly strolling about the grounds while maintaining her queenly guise from earlier, he was halted when she sharply rebuked him with a glare: "You insolent fool! Do you not recognize me?" Kure Ichirou stood frozen with stunned expression, hoe held at bay, before exclaiming "Ah! You... You are Lady Yang Guifei!" and kneeling upon the sand. At that moment, Mr. Kamakura—having barely regained consciousness—endured the pain to rise up, opened the ward entrance to release the fleeing madmen outside, then collapsed once more, perhaps from relief or fading consciousness. Thereafter, Kure Ichirou too exited the blood-drenched grounds—hoe in one hand, the corpse of Asada Shino, his first victim, tucked lightly under his other arm—after bowing to the queenly madwoman, and calmly returned to his own hospital room, Room 7; yet all present could only stand with hands clasped, trembling as they watched from afar.

Deranged Youth's Suicide The Composed Dr. Masaki Upon hearing the emergency, Dr. Masaki rushed to the scene and—maintaining an utterly composed demeanor—directed medical staff to seize both Shino's corpse and the hoe from the rampaging Ichirou. They clothed Ichirou in a restraint sleeveless shirt used for controlling lunatics, applied leg irons, and confined him to Room Seven. Meanwhile, they administered emergency treatment to four victims including Shino: two male patients whose survival remained uncertain despite non-fatal injuries, and two girls whose skulls had been crushed beyond any possibility of treatment. They urgently notified all respective next-of-kin of these outcomes. Simultaneously, Dr. Masaki returned alone to Room Seven to check on Ichirou, whom he had previously confined, only to discover the man had dashed his head against the ward wall and expired. He urgently summoned medical staff, plunging the scene into renewed chaos. Once the commotion had temporarily subsided and all necessary measures were completed, Dr. Masaki apparently left the department. When Dr. Yamada went searching for him around 2:30 PM to report that "Kure Ichirou shows signs of recovery," the professor was nowhere to be found—neither in the department classrooms nor anywhere else in the hospital—it was said.

Liberation Therapy: A Resounding Success as Anticipated "Liberation Therapy a Complete Success as Predicted!" Dr. Masaki Declares! However, during this interval, Dr. Masaki had arrived at the university headquarters where he engaged in a loud argument during his meeting with President Matsubara. Though the full details of their debate remained unclear, he repeatedly declared that "the liberation therapy experiment for the insane has achieved its anticipated resounding success through this incident," adding that "I have ordered the aforementioned Liberation Therapy Ward closed effective today." "I have caused you long-standing trouble, but thanks to your assistance, I was able to successfully conclude my experiment—my gratitude knows no bounds." (Note: The aforementioned Liberation Therapy Ward had been established by Dr. Masaki with the president’s approval using private funds, with its affiliated employees also being paid directly by him.) "Furthermore, I will submit my letter of resignation tomorrow." "I have entrusted all remaining matters to Dean Wakabayashi." With a dismissive "and so on!" he roared with laughter, flung open the door, and stormed off—whereupon all the clerks who had been listening from the adjacent room to the president’s office exchanged terrified glances, trembling as they began suspecting the professor had gone mad.

Snoring like thunder Drunken Slumber Followed by Disappearance Dr. Masaki appeared to have irresponsibly left the care of the injured patients entirely to the medical staff upon exiting the president’s office and set off for home. However, it seemed he had become thoroughly intoxicated along the way; that evening, after returning to his lodgings in Minato-machi, Fukuoka City, he slept soundly for two or three hours while emitting thunderous snores. Then around nine o'clock that same night, he nonchalantly left his lodgings under the pretext of "going out to eat," vanishing without a trace thereafter. However, according to hearsay, it was said he had secretly returned to his private office in Kyushu Imperial University’s Psychiatry Department and spent the entire night organizing documents.

Mimicked a Madman

Grotesque Corpse

At around 5 PM today, two men returning from shark fishing near the university's backshore discovered a strange drowned corpse washed ashore and reported it to Hakozaki Police Station. Chief Manda and Patrolman Mitsukawa were dispatched to investigate, whereupon examination of a business card found on the body confirmed it to be Dr. Masaki, plunging the scene into renewed commotion. Officials including Judge Atami and Clerk Matsuoka from Fukuoka District Court; Inspector Tsuikawa, Police Surgeon Hasegawa, and another from Fukuoka Police Headquarters; along with university representatives led by Dean Wakabayashi—Professors Kawaji, Anraku, Ōta, Nishikubo, and Clerk Tanaka—rushed to the site. The postmortem examination revealed that Dr. Masaki had placed his hat and cigar stub atop the stone wall behind the coastal aquarium while still wearing his white coat, bound his limbs with iron manacles and leg irons for lunatics, and apparently threw himself into the sea during high tide. With approximately three hours having passed since death, no lifesaving measures could be administered. Regarding these matters, Dean Wakabayashi and all related parties kept their mouths tightly shut without leaking a single word, evidently attempting to bury everything in utmost secrecy along with the aforementioned catastrophe; however, through this newspaper's swift investigation, the truth has thus been exposed. Incidentally, regarding the cause of Dr. Masaki's suicide, no suicide note or similar documents were found, and the study desk in his lodging house remained neatly arranged as usual, showing no signs of any abnormality. Moreover, he would return to his lodgings dead drunk or go out under the pretext of taking a walk and not come home—as such incidents had occurred once or twice every month previously, those at the lodging house apparently found nothing suspicious about it.

Strange Mystery The Deranged Youth's Utterance Regarding these matters, Mr. Kamakura Tōta—former caretaker of the Liberation Therapy Ward—spoke thus at his home in Torikai Village within the city, his injured chest still bandaged. "It was entirely unexpected. I deeply regret having accepted such a role from the beginning." "Of course the responsibility lies with me—especially now that I hear the Liberation Therapy Ward was closed yesterday—so I've submitted my resignation to Dr. Masaki and await further instructions." "That must be what they call madman's strength. Just as I was exerting full force against his resistance, he slipped my shoulder hold unexpectedly. To my shame, I fainted twice." "But after regaining consciousness from the second faint, I rushed to Room Seven with three medical staff to subdue Ichirou. The blood-maddened Ichirou was whirling his hoe like a bamboo stick, screaming 'Don't come look! Don't come look!'—too dangerous to approach." "When Dr. Masaki arrived later and came into view, Ichirou suddenly calmed down. Bowing delightedly, he pointed at Shino's half-naked corpse lying bloodsoaked on the floor and said: 'Father—could you lend me that scroll again? The one you let me borrow at the quarry?' '...I've found such an excellent model...' he uttered this bizarre statement." "Hearing this, Dr. Masaki became inexplicably agitated—his face turned so deathly pale it still horrifies me to recall—then roared 'What lunatic nonsense!' and single-handedly grappled Ichirou into submission." "For a while afterward he looked unwell, but after Ichirou dashed his head against the wall and died, he seemed to recover his composure—issuing crisp orders despite the unfolding catastrophe." (When informed of Ichirou's revival) "Huh." "Is that true?" "When I saw him, his face was drenched in blood. Dr. Masaki said he couldn't survive such severe concussion—breathing had stopped—but perhaps striking the wall while restrained lessened the impact." (When told of Dr. Masaki's suicide) Kamakura turned ashen, tears streaming as his lips trembled: "Is...is that true?" "If it were true, I couldn't remain here like this." "I owe Dr. Masaki an immeasurable debt." "When I wandered America years ago and caught pneumonia near Chicago with no one to care for me—Dr. Masaki found me and hospitalized me." "At that time he said: 'If you want to repay me, live in Fukuoka and wait for my return'—even gave me travel funds. So after hurriedly returning home, I became a judo instructor at Eihwa Academy until Dr. Masaki arrived at the university—then immediately resigned to supervise the therapy ward." "Dr. Masaki was eternally optimistic—I deeply admired him—but being principled, he must have felt profound responsibility."

“And so on.”

Meinohama's Great Fire

Famous Temple Kisaragi-ji Engulfed in Flames

Female Arsonist Meets Gruesome Death in Flames

Around 6 PM today, flames erupted from the innermost room of the main house at 1586 Kure Yayo Residence in Meinohama, Sawara District, Fukuoka Prefecture. Before startled residents could respond, prolonged clear weather and fierce winds fanned the blaze into a raging inferno. The property—containing several rental buildings—was swiftly engulfed in towering flames that leaped to the rear of nearby Kisaragi Temple's main hall, where they now spread uncontrollably. Due to the remote location, municipal firefighting forces failed to arrive in time, leaving local crews overwhelmed by the disaster's scale. The confirmed arsonist Kure Yayo (40, aunt of the aforementioned Kure Ichirou) threw herself into the temple hall's conflagration, perishing horribly by fire before spectators' eyes. This outcome likely stemmed from her exacerbated mental instability—first manifesting after losing her only daughter this spring—combined with hearing rumors today of her beloved nephew Ichirou's unnatural death circulating through the area.

――――――――――――――――――――

Raising my face from the extra edition, I—still feeling as though my head were being pressed down—timidly looked around the area.

Then, before long, right in the center of the blue cloth spread out before my nose, I found what appeared to be a card that had apparently been lying beneath the extra edition until now. ...Oh... So this was still here... I thought, impulsively standing up to peer closer. It was the back of an official postcard, bearing five or six lines of familiar upward-slanting pen strokes scrawled across it. Shameful. It was also me who drank with Professor S.

I will be reborn and start over. I entrust my son and his wife's future to you. 20th, 1:00 PM　　　　From M

Dear Brother W, The extra edition fluttered down weakly from my hand. At the same time, I felt as though the entire room was gradually sinking into the depths of the earth along with my body.

I staggered to my feet, swaying unsteadily. Without conscious thought, I tottered toward the south-facing window. A full moon glared with icy brilliance above two massive chimneys jutting from the opposite roof. Beneath its light, the Liberation Therapy Ward for the Insane lay silent and abandoned. What had appeared that morning as a flat expanse of white sand now stretched before me as a wasteland of withered grass growing in uneven clumps. At its center stood five or six paulownia trees stripped bare of every leaf, their grotesque branches twisting upward as if worshiping the starlight.

"...How strange..." As I muttered this to myself and ran my hand over my head... another strange thing... the peculiar headache I'd been feeling since morning had vanished completely - no matter where I probed or rubbed, it was nowhere to be found. Gone as though wiped away. Keeping one hand pressed against my scalp as if tracking phantom pain, I surveyed the room where yellow light beams and black shadows wove patterns of silence. Then I turned to gaze at the moonlight beyond the window - that platinum-white radiance piercing through the darkness...........................................................................................

……It was at that moment……. ……The whole truth, crystal-clear as ice, stood arrayed before me…………………………………………………………………………………………………. ……There’s nothing strange about it.

......There's nothing strange about it at all. ......I had been trapped in a double hallucination since this morning. I had contracted Dr. Masaki's so-called Soul Separation Sickness. ......I must have performed the exact same sleepwalking as today one month prior on October 20th as well. ......That morning one month prior—October 20th—also in the pitch-black predawn hours... I had been lying on the tatami mats of Room 7 in the same state as this morning, and had opened my eyes in the same condition as this morning. I had wandered about restlessly in search of my own name.

Then... after meeting with Dr. Wakabayashi and undergoing various experiments identical to this morning's in an attempt to recover my past memories, I was brought into this room where—just as this morning—I saw and heard all manner of things.

......Then, having finished reading the will, I soon met Dr. Masaki himself—the very person who had written that will—and was utterly terrified in exactly the same way as today. Then, guided by Dr. Masaki, when I peered out the south-facing window and saw the view inside the Liberation Therapy Ward—which had remained closed since the previous day—I simultaneously fell into a somnambulistic state dominated by the most recent memories within my own past recollections, and hallucinated a vision of myself outside the window observing an old man tilling his dry field at that exact time and place on the previous day, precisely as I had done then. And at that same moment, just as on that prior night, I unconsciously touched with my hand the pain in my head from when I had struck it against the wall and jerked upright.

...At that time, Dr. Masaki had explained "Soul Separation Sickness" to me in exactly the same way as today—and that explanation had indeed been the truth. Yet... at that time, I—too deeply ensnared by hallucinations to believe it—had subsequently sat face-to-face with Dr. Masaki and, after arguing exactly as before, ended up tearing into him mercilessly. In the end, I had truly driven him to resolve upon suicide.

...Yet remaining in this room unaware of such matters, I discovered Chiyoko's waka poem written at the very end of this illustrated scroll. Then, shocked just as today had been, I rushed outside and wandered through Fukuoka's streets until remembering the scroll left spread out in this room—whereupon I again raced back in the same frenzied state as today's. ...Perhaps Dr. Masaki later returned once more to this room and discovered Chiyoko's waka poem at the end of that still-unrolled illustrated scroll. And there, he may have finally steeled his resolve... but………….

...Having reached today one month after those events, I had merely been sleepwalking while repeating them precisely without the slightest deviation under the same suggestions once again...No...Perhaps from the moment I awoke so early this morning to the clock's sound, I had already been under some form of suggestion...It might have been my subconscious—which had perfectly memorized Dr. Wakabayashi's offhand remark about "one month later"—that precisely awakened me this very morning exactly one month afterward...However...In any case, during this morning while I was engrossed in reading various documents, after Dr. Wakabayashi quietly departed, there had been no one left in this room...Dr. Masaki, the bald janitor, the castella, the tea, the illustrated scroll, the investigation documents, the cigar smoke—absolutely everything had been nothing more than a reproduction of my memories from one month prior...I had merely been repeating sleepwalking within sleepwalking, all by myself...

...My head, having recovered to that extent, continued going around in circles in the same place.

......Even if I tried to convince myself otherwise, what could I do about this multitude of strange factual evidence now vividly unfolding before my eyes, pressing in on me? What could I do when there was no other way to resolve this……. ...Dr. Wakabayashi must have brought me into this room while repeating the same procedure as one month prior to experiment on my brain in such a state. And just as he likely did one month before, someone must have been monitoring me from somewhere—recording every minute movement of my somnambulistic state without omission... No... No... If even Dr. Wakabayashi's words about today being November 20, 1926 were lies, then I must have been made to repeat this same sleepwalking state countless times over since the true October 20, 1926... With every single motion preserved in records....................................................................................................................

……Oh…… Dr.Wakabayashi is truly the most terrifying embodiment of academic pursuit in existence. ...conducting experiments in mental science and forensic research simultaneously... …merging arch-villain and master detective… ...Dr.Masaki, the Kure family's destiny, Fukuoka's judicial authorities, Kyushu Imperial University's honor...every aspect of this incident—he alone controlled and manipulated them all in secret... ……And this demonic mastermind feigns ignorance………….

I began to feel an indescribable shudder crawling and racing across my entire skin like a storm. I could no longer stop each and every tooth from clattering against the others. ...While vaguely perceiving the entire room as somehow resembling the shape of Dr. Wakabayashi's gaping maw... I stood rigidly at its center, staring deep into my own whirring electric fan of a mind through my eye sockets............

......But...... ......But if that's the case... I must absolutely be Kure Ichirou............... ......Oh... oh... I am... that Kure Ichirou…………. ...That Dr. Masaki is my father... ...That Chiyoko is my mother... ……And that maddened beautiful girl… Moyoko… Moyoko is…………. ……Oh…… oh…………. ……Was I that rare mad youth—destined to curse my parents, curse my lover, and ultimately steal the lives of several unknown men and women………….

……Was I that merciless psychopath—publicly exposing the sins of my dead father in broad daylight…….

"Aaah… Fa-a-ther… Mo-o-ther…" I had shouted, but that voice never reached my own ears. I only heard a mocking echo reverberating through every corner of the room. While keeping my jaw rigidly set, I turned to look back at the flickering electric light in the silent stillness. I surveyed the room that had fallen quiet as though after some great sigh. ...With my consciousness remaining perfectly clear throughout... neither fully awake nor dreaming... as the floor before my eyes tilted toward the far side, I staggered out toward the half-open entrance.

I looked back at the white paper inscribed "Strictly No Entry or Exit" from outside the door. I must pull myself together... I must keep my reason engaged... While repeating these thoughts to myself, I staggered left and right down the windowed corridor bathed in white moonlight. Stiffening like a rod, I descended step by step down the left side of pitch-dark staircases flanking the entrance—listening to the thud... thud... of my own footsteps. Just as I thought I had finally reached the floor at the stair's end, my foot stepped into empty air, and my entire body seemed to somersault lightly... or so I thought.

From there, I don't know how I rose or where or how I walked. Before I knew it, I found myself before the door of Room 7 and discovered myself standing rigid as a stone statue.

After desperately trying to recall something I couldn't remember, I resolved to open that door and went inside. I climbed up onto the bed that remained as it had been this morning, still wearing my shoes, and flopped down heavily on my back. At the spot where my head lay, the door closed by itself with a heavy, gloomy reverberation that resounded both inside and outside the room.

Almost simultaneously with that, from the adjacent Room 6 beyond the thick concrete wall, a soul-rending, shrill woman's voice erupted.

“Brother... Brother... Let me see you. “It seems you’ve just returned now.” “That was the sound of the door.” “Let me see you, Brother… No no!… I’m not a madwoman… I’m your sister.” “I’m your sister, I’m your sister... Brother... Brother.” “Answer me… I’m here, I’m here, I’m here, I’m here!” ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………This is the Fetal Dream………………………………………………………………。

……With my eyes wide open, I lay supine on the bed and thought. ......Everything is the Fetal Dream......That girl's screams too......this dark ceiling......that window's daylight......No......everything that happened today is all part of it...... ……I’m still inside my mother’s womb. I’m writhing in agony while seeing such a terrifying "Fetal Dream"… ...And at the very moment I'm about to be born, I intend to curse and slaughter every last one of these multitudes of people...

……But still, no one knew such a thing…… Only my mother felt my tremendous fetal movements.

The sound of knocking began from the other side of the concrete wall next to where I lay.

“Brother... Brother... “Ichirou... Dear Brother... “Do you still not remember me? “It’s me… It’s me… I’m Moyoko… I’m Moyoko… “Please answer me… Answer me…” After two or three continuous knocks came a shift from pitiful sobbing to the sense that she had prostrated herself over something. I lay supine at length on the bed, holding my breath like a corpse. My eyes alone remained wide open………………………………….

......Bzzz............nnnnn...... A clock-like sound echoed from the hallway's far end. The adjacent room's weeping ceased abruptly. With that came another... ......Bzzzzzzz...... The drawn-out hum reverberated. Seeming slightly longer than before... I strained my eyes wider. ......Bzzzzzzz...... With the drone... Dr. Masaki's skeletal visage materialized before me—pince-nez glasses clinging to his sweat-dripping face... then, as if offering silent greeting, he averted his gaze and dissipated mid-smile.

......Bzzzzzzz...... Chiyoko's anguished expression materialized before my very eyes—strands of hair wildly disheveled, lower lip smeared with blood—her neck constricted by a thin cord as she stared wide-eyed with bloodshot eyes, scrutinizing my face intently. Before her trembling lips could form whatever desperate words she sought to utter, she sorrowfully closed her eyes and let tears stream freely down. Her lower lip clenched between gritted teeth rapidly turned blue; just as her pale eyes flew slightly open, she fell backward with a thud.

......Bzzzzzzz...... The jagged back of Asada Shino’s head hung low, gushing out black liquid… ......Bzzzzzzz...... Yashiroko’s blood-covered face, her eyes pulled wide... ......Bzzz... Bzzz... Bzzz... Bzzz... Bzzz......

A spiky chestnut-burr head with torn cheeks... A girl wearing long hanging hair whose forehead had been smashed... A beard-covered face with the skin ripped from its brow...

I covered my face with both hands. I jumped down from the bed just like that...and dashed straight ahead.

Then my forehead collided with something hard, and a bright light flashed before my eyes. ...the next moment everything plunged back into utter darkness. In that instant, a face identical to mine appeared in the darkness before me—wild hair and beard bristling fiercely, sunken pupils glittering. And when our faces met, he suddenly opened a crimson mouth wide and let out a dry laugh... but...

“Ah… Wu Qingxiu…” Before I could even cry out, he vanished as if erased. ......Bzzzzzzz............Hmm............Hmmmmm.............