Pathway to Japanese Literature

I Atop a remote hill on the village outskirts appeared a hastily erected hut—unbeknownst to all—its beams draped with gaudy curtains bearing the name Far Eastern Circus Troupe. To frenzied jinta rhythms and reedy flute notes trembling through the air, young and old villagers alike briefly reveled in violent hues, music, and thrills. And even after the troupe drifted elsewhere just as suddenly, they would still recall—for a time—the strangled limbs of boys and girls glimpsed fleetingly within white drifting clouds.

Even amidst that dazzling atmosphere, there still existed a small "troubled insect."

I-2 “Idiot! Can’t you even do that, you useless fool!” The Troupe Leader barked those vulgar words, then glared fiercely at Kurokichi while striking the floor repeatedly with his leather whip. Kurokichi, still just a young boy, trembled fearfully, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” After murmuring such things while rubbing the shoulder of his tattered flesh-colored undergarment, he clumsily rolled into handstand after handstand on the ice-cold floor.

Hunger and fear and pain and chill—and the other troupe members’ mockery—though already routine occurrences, swarmed thickly around Kurokichi until tears like seething blood streamed unbidden down his face. They left black stains on the rough-hewn floorboards as they seeped soundlessly away. —Here was the backstage of the Far Eastern Circus Troupe. The unskilled, clumsy Kurokichi was the boy performer here.

Karasu Kurokichi. That was his name. But was this merely a stage name, or his real one? Judging by the characters, it was likely a name the Troupe Leader had arbitrarily bestowed upon him—but as for his true name, not only did he himself have no certainty, it was doubtful whether even the Troupe Leader knew it for sure.

As for Kurokichi’s own memories, they were exceedingly vague—but pitifully, they always began in the corner of this circus troupe, from the costume closet. From the moment he first became aware—from when his memories began—his surroundings had always been painted by overlapping layers: the tragic jinta music, crumpled costumes in garish hues, the pervasive stench of cheap white makeup, and the suffocating odor of sweat-stained flesh-colored undergarments.

Amidst this decadent atmosphere, the ceaseless friction among troupe members and the warped, bluish-black air that settled beneath the glamour stripped every last trace of “cheerfulness” from young Kurokichi’s heart. And thus, what remained in that gloomy heart—like some shadow-dwelling insect—was a view of the world seen only through this singularly warped lens.

When he had no tasks, he would always sit in the dimly lit corner of the backstage—where thick logs bound with coarse ropes crisscrossed endlessly like a spiderweb—vacantly lost in thought. It was a melancholic, effeminate figure—unlike any boy. Kurokichi clearly feared being called by his fellow boy performers— “Hey, get over here!” he appeared to fear being called out to. However, that was merely his own apprehension. The other boy performers—none of them ever willingly sought to play with Kurokichi, with his melancholic face, clumsy acts, and poor standing with the Troupe Leader. (While this may have partly stemmed from their wariness of the fearsome Troupe Leader,) it rather seemed that even when Kurokichi approached them, they would never give a favorable response.

In the end, Kurokichi took advantage of this situation to remain solitary in the forgotten corner of the hut, indulging in the one trivial "fantasy" that remained as his oasis.

I-3 What was the melancholic boy Kurokichi thinking?

―But before that, we must address why he had fallen into the Troupe Leader’s disfavor.

(For this too had a profound effect on his melancholic disposition.) No matter how one looked at him, Kurokichi could not be considered the Troupe Leader’s "favorite." Of course, his being an unskilled and clumsy performer was indeed one cause—but the other major cause lay in the congenital misfortune of his ugly features, by which he was cursed. Could a boy’s appearance truly torment a young heart so profoundly—

Indeed, for those who lived on stage, the beauty or ugliness of one’s face was an immense handicap. If his adorable fellow boy performer were to somehow plop down hard on his backside during a performance, the audience would— “Oh, how pitiful… Ah, he’s turning all red and looking over here—just like Masami-san, isn’t he?”

Saying this, the cute, handsome boy would ironically gain the audience’s favor precisely because of his failure. But in contrast, even when Kurokichi—with his ugly features—made the same kind of mistake on stage, the audience would mock this awkward boy’s clumsiness without the slightest restraint. As for Kurokichi—mocked even by these spectators—one could well imagine how utterly idiotic, how thoroughly worthless he must have appeared to the Troupe Leader. Therefore, as for what kind of treatment the Troupe Leader subjected Kurokichi to—

(I’m bad at my act.) (I’m an ugly man.) In the dim corner of the hut, Kurokichi sat alone, lost in thought—far from pleasant fantasies, for within his young heart raged these two unchildlike torments, ceaseless as a storm. And this only relentlessly drove those boyish, dependent feelings deep into the recesses of his heart, doing nothing but render him all the more gloomy. In his cold, cold chest, the only hot thing was a single tear.

In such an atmosphere, Karasu Kurokichi—confined within it—could never have grown straight.

And thus, here was forged a boy with a pallid, twisted heart—a solitary creation.

Was it around the time when the world’s boys and girls eagerly began attending elementary school? Of course, such a privileged life lay far beyond Kurokichi’s imagination.

However, from around this time, Kurokichi began to view the boys and girls among his young fellow performers through different eyes.

There was no clear difference, so to speak—but when mocked by girls, he strangely didn’t feel the same indignation as when berated by boys. Rather, (If only I were struck by that hand...) When he thought this, he felt something shivery—a sensation akin to joy. What this was—Kurokichi had gradually come to see its form with clarity.

I-4 In this decadent backstage of the Far Eastern Circus Troupe—where the stench of cheap white makeup, sweat-dampened bodies, and flimsy garish costumes lay strewn like rags—the "twisted heart" of that gloomy boy, bred within contempt, had begun to smolder relentlessly with a peculiar obsession for precocious girls.

――And then an event occurred that spurred it on even further. It was the day before their public opening—when they had finally finished setting up the huts on the grounds, with tomorrow marking the long-awaited debut. As usual, the Troupe Leader oversaw the hut construction with his stern expression, but once it was finished, he put on a face as though he’d “accomplished a grand task” and went off somewhere to amuse himself with his other favorite executives. After seeing off the Troupe Leader as he left for his amusement, the older troupe members and band staff—now finally relaxed—began raising boisterous laughter through their various idle chats, while Senji the jokester was inspecting his stage costume for his role as the clown.

“Oi, the old man’s gone. Should I head out too?” As if precisely that had been a signal, the voices suddenly grew louder.

“Yeah, gotta have a drink once in a while…” “Damn, ‘once in a while’ my ass. You’ve got some nerve talkin’ like that.” “There’s tomorrow—you sure that’s okay?” “Nah, if we don’t do a little somethin’, this’ll never last. If ya don’t like it, quit.” “Nah, ain’t like I mind.” “Ha ha ha, annoying as hell!”

With evident delight, chattering noisily all the while, yet hurriedly preparing, they were set free into the town.

And before long, within this desolate hut, only Old Genjirō the bedding manager and the child performers remained, left scattered in isolation. The child performers were forbidden from going out. This was of course a precaution against “desertion.”

The role of watchman—though Old Genjirō had now grown senile—was once shouldered by this very man who had borne the troupe on his back in days gone by. In the end, the young children had no choice but to play each on their own within the hut. The boys ran around the stage with their fellow boys, and the girls clustered together girlishly to jump rope.—And Kurokichi remained, as ever, all alone in the corner of the hut.

However, unlike usual, Kurokichi’s eyes seemed to be staring intently at something.

(What could this melancholy, timid boy be staring at so intently?) Anyone who knew his usual self and noticed this state would surely have tilted their head in puzzlement. And had one casually followed this boy’s gaze, they might have averted their eyes in shock.

Right before Kurokichi’s eyes, the girl performers, dressed in simple uniforms, were jumping rope—. But what he was staring at was not that. When these girls leaped over the rope—nearly as tall as themselves—and touched down with a thud, their simple uniform skirts would catch the wind and flutter apart, revealing glimpses of plump white thighs—.

(Would a boy of ten or so stare with bated breath at such things—?)

When one considered this, before that intensely unpleasant sensation lay something else—a bone-chilling terror that made one shudder.

However, that wasn’t the whole of it.

II

Those “plump white thighs”—which had relentlessly churned through this melancholic boy’s very core—now swirled ceaselessly through his mind in great vortices, sweeping everything before them. When the whirlpool in his heart finally began to calm, what rose up from its depths was the face of this troupe’s star girl performer, Yukiko Shishida. But at the same time, Kurokichi felt an intensely unpleasant sensation—as though he’d been suddenly struck down.

(Tch—no matter how much I try to play with Yukiko-chan, it’s no good. I’m terrible at my act. And besides, would someone as beautiful as Yukiko-chan ever play with a dirty kid like me…)

But the strange obsession with Yukiko-chan—seared deep into this boy’s heart—would not waver in the slightest at such trifles.

Rather— (No good.) The more he thought about it, the more this urge to suddenly scream at the top of his lungs—this very restlessness—only flared further into an unbearable frenzy.

―From around this time, his demeanor seemed to be changing little by little. Had someone looked closely enough, they would have noticed that Kurokichi’s eyes—still there alone in the corner of the hut—had taken on a strange gleam. And at those times, without fail, the young star Yukiko would be flitting about in an adorable form at the end of his gaze. Though Yukiko was still around the same age as Kurokichi—about ten years old—she was beautiful, skilled in her craft, and as cheerful as a free little bird. Even that stern troupe leader doted on her beyond measure, so within this dismal circus troupe, she alone appeared perfectly happy.

And of course, this gloomy, ugly Kurokichi was scrutinizing her every move as though savoring every morsel—something she likely never noticed. For Kurokichi himself, the fact that she paid no mind to someone like him was a tormenting itch of emotion. Of course she would never— “Come over here.” If only she were to call out to me—how happy that would make me.—But on the other hand, “You’re so slovenly—I absolutely despise someone like you.”

No sooner would he worry she might retort like that than—far from speaking to her—even if Yukiko merely glanced his way casually, (She’s going to laugh at me) This sensation surged back like fire through his veins. And so, he would abruptly avert his eyes. Kurokichi, even as he himself recognized this warped sentiment, found himself utterly unable to shed it—alongside his adoration for Yukiko.

×

As if suddenly remembering, the lively jinta finished playing "Shikishima March" through once, then immediately began "Kachūsha." As the thin, reedy sound of the flute faded into the azure sky, through those intervals echoed the parched-voiced barker’s calls—stirring restless unease even in the troupe members’ hearts.

“Alright, Yukiko-chan’s up!” “Oh my, it’s already my turn? I’m so busy!” “Hurry, hurry!” Yukiko, in a flurry, took a bite of her rice cracker and rushed out of the costume room.

Just then，Kurokichi—who happened to be passing by—caught a glimpse of it；for some reason，he gently yet reverently took the half-eaten rice cracker and carried it away.

II-II Kurokichi, who had stealthily retrieved the half-eaten cracker Yukiko had discarded, passed through the area where troupe members—their faces flushed beneath thickly caked white stage makeup—were busily talking together, feigning ignorance until he reached the shadowed corner of the hut where seat cushions lay stacked like a mountain.

Kurokichi knew from experience that once the performance began, people rarely came to such a place. Even so, after carefully confirming that the area was deserted, he stealthily hunched his body and slipped into the gap between the precariously stacked seat cushions. The gap was undeniably cramped, yet it had a strangely warm, elastic quality that felt somehow nostalgic. Kurokichi, finally savoring a sigh-like calmness, took that piece of cracker and—as though it were some precious jewel—gently placed it on his palm to examine.

(This must be Yukiko-chan’s half-eaten piece.) When he thought that, he felt a happiness that relaxed his cheeks. …Like something he wanted to keep so very carefully… Like something he wanted to tightly embrace—.

Kurokichi, having fully savored his happiness, once more gazed at it deeply in the faint light. Examining it closely like this—whether due to his nerves or not—the fragment of rice cracker seemed somewhat damp.

Carefully, when he touched it, he found that the bitten part was indeed slightly damp.

(Is this Yukiko-chan’s saliva?) Kurokichi’s small heart quaked violently at this unexpected treasure.

Even though he was a boy, he certainly hadn’t picked up this single piece of rice cracker just because he wanted to eat it. To Kurokichi, in the fact that it was "Yukiko’s half-eaten portion," this rice cracker appeared no different from a diamond of however many carats.

However, when he touched it, the fragment felt damp... (This must be Yukiko-chan’s saliva.)

At that moment, in Kurokichi’s head vividly arose the scene of Yukiko hurriedly holding this rice cracker between her lips in the costume room, followed by a close-up of her adorable crimson lips.

Along with that, he involuntarily gulped down a stiff lump of saliva. Kurokichi, his eyes glinting eerily, stole a glance around; then, as though steeling himself, he gingerly brought the fragment of cracker—undoubtedly dampened by Yukiko’s saliva—to his lips……. (Salty… Hmm.) This was, of course, the taste of the salt rice cracker. But Kurokichi’s hand trembled violently for some reason.

His face, unboyish and deeply shadowed, had grown feverishly flushed; the blood violently ejected from his heart sent rippling waves through his temples.

And now, from the fragment of rice cracker that had melted into a gooey mess in his palm, he continued lapping frenziedly—forgetting everything—still trying to detect “Yukiko’s scent”…….

“Hey! What’re you doin’, Kuro-kō?”

When he noticed with a start, Old Genjirō’s angry, suspicious face was peering out from beyond the mountain of futons.

“Ain’t it your turn? Quit dawdlin’, or you’ll catch hell again.” “Yeah.” The instant Kurokichi recalled the Master’s face, he jerked upright. Rubbing his sticky palms over and over against his flesh-colored undergarment, he hurriedly ran off toward the dressing room.

II-III

Kurokichi, while executing the various acrobatic feats he had been ordered to perform, found his mind remained perpetually consumed by thoughts of Yukiko. (If only once—just once—I could speak deeply with Yukiko-chan.) This was the sole desire that had taken root within his warped heart. Had he been a more cheerful, ordinary child—with Yukiko always sharing the same hut—such an exchange would surely have come about effortlessly. Yet Kurokishi proved far too sullen and twisted a boy—though this very quality had been forged by his shadow-drenched surroundings—.

And when his obsession with the precocious Yukiko became uncontainable, what he discovered was the horrifying ecstasy born from that fragment of rice cracker. Once his heart had found such an outlet, there was no way it could simply stop—rather, it surged toward that outlet like a tsunami. He had even quietly checked that no one was around, slipped into the costume room, and buried his hideous face in Yukiko’s small flesh-colored undergarment.

The smell of white stage makeup and the stifling odor of body sweat imparted to him an intoxicating sensation even accompanied by dizziness. Then, suddenly discovering a few strands of Yukiko’s bobbed hair clinging to the flesh-colored undergarment, he—ecstatic over this monumental find—carefully plucked them up, wrapped them in white paper, and with a nearby pencil, “Yukiko-chan’s Hair”

He hesitantly scrawled those words in clumsy handwriting, rubbed over them once more, then stashed it deep against his skin…

That his perverse habit had only grown more obsessive could easily be imagined from how Yukiko’s belongings began disappearing with increasing frequency afterward. To say things disappeared was one thing, but of course the circus troupe girl had no reason to possess anything of real value—it was always utterly worthless things: a single worn-down clog blackened with greasy foot stains, a bamboo toothbrush missing half its bristles, and the like. And so,

(Stolen) That even Yukiko herself never sensed this feeling of theft was his unexpected fortune. Yet how dearly these "worthless lost things" were cherished by Kurokichi remains easily imaginable.

Up to this point, it had been a desolate (yet tenacious) love—fermented in the heart of the boy Kurokichi, a love that existed solely within his own breast.

But here, Yukiko was about to make a gallant entrance onto the real stage, accompanied by a tempest.

×

The Far Eastern Circus Troupe drifted from town to town, from one bustling district to the next, all while entertaining the crowds. And then, no sooner had they borrowed a plot in a certain rural town and finally finished setting up the tent than the sky—which had been puzzling them since morning—collapsed all at once: large raindrops, carrying an ominous wind, began pattering down, only to transform into a torrential downpour as thick as bamboo grass.

The troupe leader and the others had promptly retreated to the inn, but the child members and lower-ranked members were always ordered to stay in this hut due to financial constraints. On the children’s side, they took this for granted; moreover, with the troupe leader gone, they even seemed rather pleased.

However, this hastily erected hut could not possibly withstand the torrential downpour; after scrambling to escape the leaking rain, they finally managed to lie down huddled together in a corner of the dressing room—by which time the night had already grown quite late. Kurokichi closed his eyes and listened to the rain, which seemed to have finally eased, when from right beside him—shoulder to shoulder—came the faint sound of breathing.

At the same moment, Kurokichi felt something jolt through him. (Could it be... Yukiko-chan sleeping right beside me——)

II-IV

In an instant, Kurokichi felt his head become crystal clear. (Could it really be Yukiko-chan sleeping next to me?)

It was, of course, something extremely vague—if you could even call it a sixth sense. But given that commotion had left everyone sleeping in a jumble, it wasn’t entirely impossible. When he thought that, the area where his shoulder touched hers felt feverish—even stifling. And with each pounding beat, his heart swelled to fill his entire chest.

Kurokichi, summoning his resolve, felt the impulse to sit up and peer at her face. The surroundings were pitch black, but if he looked carefully, it didn’t seem impossible to make out a face. He gingerly placed his hand on the edge of the thin futon. But— (Wait—wait.) If it’s Yukiko-chan, there could be nothing more wonderful than this. But in such a tightly packed sleeping space, if I were to stir around, she might wake up.

If that were all, it would be fine—but if she were to wake and discover I had been peering at her, Yukiko-chan would surely turn crimson, curse this ugly me, and move her bedding somewhere far away without fail.

Rather than doing such a foolish thing—even if only briefly—how much more clever it would be to indulge in the sensation of Yukiko-chan’s plump shoulder like this until daybreak……)

The timid half of Kurokichi’s heart whispered thus. He quietly withdrew the hand he had placed on the futon, then—this time—focusing every ounce of his attention, inched closer to her until their bodies touched. There, near his shoulder, he listened to the gentle rhythm of her heart blended with warmth……. Suddenly feeling a cold wind, he opened eyes that had somehow closed without his noticing—and became aware of an extremely faint light seeping through their surroundings.

(Is it already dawn—when did I fall asleep?) Along with that came a jolt of regret—a trembling, almost vexing frustration that shook his body. (Yukiko-chan…)

First, because that was his foremost concern, Kurokichi sharply turned his neck to check the adjacent space. (Oh...)

What entered his eyes before Yukiko was half of a sharp, piercingly clear moon. The hastily erected hut’s canopy, battered by the evening’s violent storm, gaped open to the night sky; through this very breach, the moon leaned forward as if peering in, scattering a pale, silken light into the hut’s interior—stagnant and silent as the depths of the earth. After the storm, the moon was terrifyingly crystal-clear.

(It’s still the middle of the night.) Kurokichi expelled his worries with a breath.

Next to him lay Yukiko, sleeping in a manner that looked thoroughly uncomfortable. Earlier, he hadn’t been able to definitively assert it was Yukiko, but now—though the light was extremely faint—even within it, as his eyes gradually adjusted, Yukiko’s figure came into clear view for Kurokichi.

Kurokichi—as if resolved—pulled half his body out of the futon and, so as not to block the moonlight—without making a sound—gently peered at her face. Under his gaze lay Yukiko’s childish face, bathed in moonlight and appearing paler than usual, her mouth even slightly parted as she slept deeply. If the moonlight were just a bit stronger, he thought, this tufted bob-cut hair would surely shine like gold——.

Moreover, the faded white stage makeup at the nape of her neck made even this childish Yukiko’s sleeping form appear all the more charming to the boy’s heart. For a while, Kurokichi stared blankly at Yukiko’s dreamlike, hazy face—then audibly swallowed a hard lump in his throat and gradually, as if trying to listen for her breath through those slightly parted lips, brought his face closer and closer. For some reason, his lips were parched and rough. Before long, beneath this feeble moonlight, as the shadows of their two small heads merged into one, he felt the small, charming mole on Yukiko’s cheek pressing into his own.

II-V The sensation of Yukiko’s lips that Kurokichi felt against his own was like a warm, springy fish cake. It may have been a strange association, but in truth, within his experience, this was the closest resemblance. However, there was a difference—a profoundly different aspect—but unfortunately, he didn’t know the words to describe it. He tried to gently release the strength in his arm. The moment he did, the plank under his elbow let out a dull thud. Because it was a poorly constructed temporary hut, even a slight shift in weight would make the planks creak. The hushed surroundings and his needle-sharp nerves amplified it layer upon layer, sending reverberations through him.

Kurokichi’s heart seemed to stop dead with a loud thud in that instant. “Kh…”

Beneath Kurokichi’s panicked gaze—his face jerked upward—Yukiko let out a guttural sound as though trapped in a nightmare, turned over, and lay facing away. (Did she wake up?) Kurokichi drew a shuddering breath as he watched her ink-dark figure turned from him. (No—she’s still asleep.) Yukiko showed no signs of waking after turning over; soon the faint rhythm of her sleeping breaths returned. At last he exhaled a stifled “huu,” fingers brushing his lips as he scanned the bluish-black gloom surrounding them…….

……The next day, in stark contrast to last night’s violent storm, a clear azure sky stretched endlessly above.

Kurokichi climbed up along the hut’s log, savoring by himself the chance occurrence of the previous night. When he reached the top and thrust his head out, what entered his eyes was the sight of the forest directly opposite—glistening with trapped moisture. (How beautiful it is... Ah—but)

What brushed faintly across the edge of his chest was Yukiko. In that moment, this boy felt Yukiko held a rawer, more vivid beauty. (The forest…) As he muttered this, his arm gripping the log twitched reflexively when someone spoke by his ear—until now, being addressed had almost never brought him anything good— “What’s so special about some forest, Kuro-chan?”

Kurokichi couldn’t respond. Before he realized when she had arrived, Yukiko was standing right before his eyes. Moreover, until now, no one had ever—not even once—called him “Kuro-chan” so kindly……. “What’re you thinking about?” Yukiko smiled adorably in the warm sunlight. “I was looking at the forest.” Kurokichi couldn’t bring himself to look directly at her face. And while shuffling his feet restlessly against the crossbar, he said:

“Oh, you were looking at the forest? You’re such a poet, aren’t you?”

This cute, precocious girl—where had she learned such things?—said exactly that. Kurokichi couldn't come up with a reply. "The forest really is beautiful... You like forests, don't you?" "Because it's beautiful—" "Nuh-uh, I hate forests." "You're the one who's beautiful, aren't you?" "Oh—"

Yukiko opened her large eyes girlishly in delight. “But I’m ugly...” “You’ll play with me.”

He was gradually finding his voice. “Of course I will.” (Yukiko sometimes used rough language.) “I like you because you’re so gentle, Kuro-chan. Last night too…” “Huh? You knew…?” “You knew—?” Kurokichi involuntarily flinched.

2-6 “There’s no need to act so surprised.” “It was my first kiss too.” Kurokichi felt his face flush hotly. And when he thought how this ten-year-old girl could speak so bluntly of such things, he wondered if a demon dwelled within her lovely form. However much she’d grown up in squalor, it chilled him to the bone.

“When did you get here?”

He said this, at a loss for a reply. “I saw you climbing up and came right after.” “Do you have business—”

“Hmm, I don’t have any business here… You’re such a strange one—do you hate me?” “Then why did you do something like that?” “No! That’s not true!” “I… I love you—Yukiko-chan!” “But… no matter how I try, I just can’t say it right……”

This was Kurokichi's true feelings.

“Oh well, let’s sit here.”

Yukiko vacated the seat for Kurokichi, and the two sat side by side on a roof beam log. Had someone seen them, they would have appeared as nothing more than circus children basking in the sun. “I knew about last night.” Yukiko was oddly persistent.

“Then why did you pretend to be asleep?”

“But…” “That bug-like (oh, I’m sorry—everyone calls you that because you’re always huddled in the corner…) but I’ve fallen in love with you.” When Kurokichi heard the unpleasant nickname “bug” come from her lips, he felt as if he had swallowed something bitter and fell silent. “So I’ll tell you something good.”

Yukiko said this and began swinging her dangling legs back and forth. Each time, Yukiko’s plump shoulder brushed against Kurokichi’s somewhat stiffened body. He felt an inexplicable stirring from that soft sensation and vividly recalled last night’s dream. And the bitterness gradually evaporated. “What’s this ‘good thing’?”

Yukiko continued to swing her legs. At times their bodies collided so violently—so much so that it seemed intentional—. Each time, Kurokichi’s hardened heart melted away without a sound.

“About this ‘good thing’—if you’re bad at your act, it won’t work. The master will despise you, and everyone will call you a fool.” Yukiko spoke with sisterly affectation. “Yeah.” “That’s why I learned something good.” “Do you really mean to try your hardest?” “I’ll do it! Are we doing it together, Yukiko-chan?” “No, not together…… but it’s a terribly difficult act—nobody does it now. Old Genjirō was the last to perform it when he was young. If you can manage it, even the master will treasure you.”

“Yeah.” “If we can really do it properly, let’s perform it together—we’ll ask the Master…” “Yes, let’s do that! Otherwise it’d be boring.” “But what exactly is it?”

Kurokichi had become completely cheerful. He had cast off yesterday’s soggy mood with all the vigor of a boy his age and now wanted to laugh like the sun. Down below, Old Genjirō—while drying seat cushions soaked in last night’s rain—happened to glance up and spotted Yukiko, the troupe’s star girl, and “Bug” chatting happily and holding hands on the hut’s roof; he made a puzzled face.

III

The "puzzlement" Old Genjirō first felt soon spread to all members of the troupe—save for Yukiko alone.

Kurokichi—gloomy, clumsy at his craft, nicknamed "Bug"—had begun practicing acrobatics with such fervor whenever he had a spare moment that it seemed he had been reborn. It was, without a doubt, an astonishing change. Had the timid, effeminate Kurokichi regained his innate boyish "cheerfulness"—? Be that as it may, his training was too ferocious, too blood-drenched a thing. Kurokichi’s boyishly moist eyes were flushed with spiderweb-like blood vessels, and from his tightly clenched lips, one feared fresh blood might soon drip freely.

At times, his body would fly through the air and be slammed against the wooden boards. Even so, aside from the groans he occasionally let slip, Kurokichi still refused to bare his teeth.

However, when they heard that dull, ghastly sound of flesh and bone colliding against each other, it was rather the other troupe members who had been watching in bewilderment that found themselves involuntarily biting their lips or turning their faces away. And even the strict, ice-like troupe leader could only stand there dumbfounded.

But Yukiko— Strangely enough, Yukiko—the very driving force behind Kurokichi’s sudden transformation—was nowhere to be seen here. Yet had any troupe member looked around carefully, they would have noticed Yukiko—hiding herself in the dimly lit corner of the training area—staring fixedly at this scene. Even if someone had noticed Yukiko, no one would have connected this girl to Kurokichi’s dramatic transformation—no, it would have seemed far more natural for her to be secretly watching this blood-drenched training.

However, this was a fortunate coincidence for her. She had been feeling such intense excitement since earlier that, even as she tried to rush into this beast-like atmosphere of clashing flesh and bone—so fierce it seemed alive—her legs refused to move forward. And the hallucinatory intoxication—accompanied by a relentless, constricting pressure—that the writhing mass of flesh before her eyes exuded inflicted pain upon this girl even in the mere act of standing. She clenched her sweaty palms, her breath coming in ragged gasps.

(Ah, blood—)

Kurokichi had a nosebleed. He panicked and looked up; the nosebleed, leaving a dark red streak from beside his nose, retreated behind his ear.

Yukiko felt her chest become hollow in an instant. At the same time, what welled up within her was a dizzying, perverse ecstasy… Yukiko, as if suddenly noticing her surroundings, looked around—perhaps because of the nosebleed, Kurokichi was no longer there—and saw the other boy troupe members starting their individual practices while whispering furtively among themselves. (They must be talking about Kuro-chan.)

Yukiko finally stood up to search for Kurokichi with that thought. After searching everywhere in vain, when she spotted Kurokichi in the sunlit area of the scaffold, Yukiko immediately rushed over. “Kuro-chan, you’re amazing! I never thought you had that much courage.” “It’s not amazing—I was watching you, Yukiko-chan.” Kurokichi’s nosebleed had stopped, but as he rubbed his still-swollen body, he nevertheless looked happy. “I was watching—I got so startled when you got a nosebleed…… Oh, it’s bright red—the blood’s seeping out.”

Yukiko, for some reason, stared fixedly at Kurokichi’s red, swollen shoulder with its blood-filled pores.

III-2

The scaffold, bathed in full bright sunlight, was pleasantly warm, and there were no other figures visible in the surroundings. “Is there blood?” “Ah! Don’t touch—it’ll hurt!” “…………”

Yukiko did not respond. However, those eyes were fixed on the bruise-like wound as if scorching it.

“Kuro-chan, does it hurt?”

Yukiko, having said that, seemed to touch the wound again gently. “It hurts…”

Kurokichi involuntarily swallowed back the words that had nearly escaped him. Around the wound—though he couldn’t see it—he felt something lukewarm and smooth. (Did she lick it…?) No sooner had he thought this than the wounded half of his body went numb with a heavy throb all the way to his toes.

“Yukiko-chan…” He panicked—even those uttered words had gone numb. For Kurokichi himself, this grotesque tactile sensation marked his first experience—yet as he felt himself being licked two or three times more, it began to seem not entirely disagreeable. Rather, there emerged that mysteriously heart-pounding pleasure akin to being tickled. Each time her viscous, supple tongue dragged across what must have been an unsightly wound, Kurokichi’s heightened nerves thudded—thudded downward through his body until colliding at his feet.

“Well, does it hurt?” Yukiko peered into his face. “Nuh-uh.”

Kurokichi panickedly shook his head. “Does it look like it hurts?” “Because your body was trembling. I told you licking it would make it heal faster.”

Applying saliva to wounds was among them a common—the most primitive—method of treatment. However—was it truly out of genuine kindness that Yukiko had licked it—? At the very least, Kurokichi believed it was her kindness. But when he considered her earlier inexplicable behavior, a terrifying possibility arose—that this lovely girl might have felt a cruel fascination with that gruesome blood-seeping wound, an impulse to lick it. No—she had clearly felt that excitement. If merely applying saliva would suffice, there would be no need to go so far as to lick it—

However, Kurokichi's chest swelled with happiness. "Yukiko-chan, that's enough. "It doesn't hurt anymore."

Yukiko silently raised her face. “I have something I want to ask you... Yukiko-chan.” “What?” “Why... why do you spend time with an ugly thing like me?” “You’re not ugly.” “I like you.” “You’re gentle.” “I hate pale show-offs like Gikō—all pasty white but acting so high and mighty.”

Gikō was a fellow young performer in Kurokichi's troupe—a lovely, handsome boy. Kurokichi felt displeasure merely hearing that name from her lips. "...And then when Gikō catches me on the ladder, he deliberately squeezes me tight." Gikō's impudent face floated before Kurokichi's eyes. (Damn it...) He growled through clenched teeth as if to strike down that phantom vision. At that moment, an intense "jealousy"—uncharacteristic of a boy—scattered like sparks through Kurokichi's heart.

San no San

“Yukiko-chan… Even if I die, I won’t lose to someone like Gikō.” Kurokichi spat out those words and stood up, forgetting the pain of his wound. “Don’t lose for real, okay? If you become the lead performer here, I’ll be happy. …We could even become husband and wife.” “Husband and wife…”

Even Kurokichi, his childlike face slightly flushed with instinctive shyness, turned to look back at Yukiko.

“It’s true. …Are you saying I’m lying?” Yukiko grew defensive, pursing her lips.

“Alright.” “Then let’s make our promise right here.”

Having said this to hide his embarrassment, Kurokichi thrust out his pinky. And so the two of them, atop the bright scaffold bathed in sunlight, made a solemn, unbreakable promise in a manner so utterly childlike. —In what form would this boy and girl’s promise come to visit them……. Though this remained entirely uncertain, between this gloomy and tenacious boy and the girl who grew excited amid cruel airs, it seemed impossible to hope for any ordinary conclusion.—But that was a matter for much later.

At present, atop the scaffold where he stood bathed in sunlight, Kurokichi’s heart was a surge of happiness—riding waves of jubilation that roiled without reservation.

And his blood-soaked, intense training made his body writhe even more as a mere lump of flesh on the cold floorboards.

And in proportion to this, Yukiko’s caresses toward him escalated with accelerating intensity. Though the precise nature of those caresses remained their shared secret, Kurokichi had discovered the small mole hidden beneath her lips and learned that Yukiko’s palms grew damp with sweat at night. At times, when he quietly examined his shoulder wound in the costume room’s mirror, he would find—strangely enough—that the wound had taken on the shape of a small lip, with blood seeping through it—as if Yukiko had sucked it with force—or so he thought.

However, apart from those black shadows, Kurokichi’s skills advanced rapidly. This life-risking training—ceaselessly spurred onward—had become utterly incomparable to those days when even his clumsy handstands had enraged the Master. His supple, stretching body completely stripped away any apprehension from his performance art, leaving the audience with nothing but rapture and applause. And thus, the name “Kurokichi” was printed large alongside “Yukiko Shishida” in the galley paper advertisements as the troupe’s star boy and girl performers.

He was overjoyed beyond compare simply to have his name listed alongside Yukiko’s. When they arrived in a new town and paraded through the streets in formation to draw crowds—times when only the two of them rode together in a small cart as part of the procession—beneath his thickly caked white stage makeup, how intoxicated Kurokichi was with rapture—. Along with a confidence in his art he had never known before, he also felt an unforgettable obsession—much like what he had experienced with Yukiko—.

Kurokichi, while learning breathing techniques from Old Genjirō—a master of his former craft—finally began practicing a terrifying acrobatic feat. It was a stunt where swings were suspended from both ends of a high cabin’s ceiling—one would leap from one swing to the other—simple enough to describe in words, but this daring feat performed in the dizzying heights of that cabin’s air was an all-or-nothing gamble. If he let his hand slip even slightly, he would have to bloom a rotten fig-like flower of blood upon the frigid earth far below.

IV Amidst an atmosphere too kaleidoscopic for one so young—where he now spent nearly every day devoured by his art and transactions with Yukiko—Kurokichi’s world had quietly relegated several incidents to the past until he found himself a youth of sixteen. Yet this protracted crucible of training—mitigated by Yukiko’s consolations—proved neither dreary nor ultimately fruitless.

He was already the troupe’s undisputed star acrobat. Indeed, at sixteen—by age alone—he was considered a full-fledged man in their world. On top of that, he had made those terrifying aerial feats that no one else could perform his signature act—. Moreover, what must not be forgotten here was Yukiko. Yukiko too had gradually developed plump flesh filled with fat across her entire body; the softly rounded contours flowing from her form had turned pale and gained supple elasticity. Moreover, the faint fragrance one would suddenly notice when passing by her side bore clear testimony to her maturation. Furthermore, Yukiko’s privileged beauty was approaching an ever more bewitching perfection with each passing year.

The jet-black bobbed hair that cascaded down each time she shook her neck against her pale, prominent forehead had the beauty of seaweed. Her bright eyes and finely shaped nose embodied a tranquil beauty, while the gleaming white teeth peeking from between her slightly parted crimson lips mercilessly gouged into the audience’s hearts.

Why did this beautiful Yukiko show favor to that Kurokichi with his ugly countenance—?

“Yukiko-chan’s got some weird tastes, don’t she? No matter how much better he gets at his act, hookin’ up with the likes of Kuro-kō here…” “It’s not like there ain’t any handsome men around here—”

Senji the clown, still in his ridiculous costume, stroked his chin. “Hahaha.—And here we’ve got Lord Senji himself, a real looker…” “Honestly…” “You’re shacking up with her, huh?”

Though their conversation was laced with jokes, this was among them the most intriguing—and mystifying—issue. From what Senji had said, the troupe members seemed to think Kurokichi had received Yukiko’s favor because he had improved—and it appeared none of them knew about that strange incident from their childhood days, an event involving only the two of them.

“But—”

Senji once again assumed a serious expression and continued.

“Heard somethin’. Kurokō here told me—says he’s gonna marry Yukiko-chan, claims she proposed it first. Ain’t funny.”

“Really? …Honestly, with how things are now, I can’t tell…” “Don’t be stupid!” The one who suddenly spoke up was Gikō, the beautiful boy who had lost both his star position and even Yukiko to Kurokichi. “That’s impossible! I know for sure! That Kurokichi guy’s gettin’ beat by Yukiko-chan all the time, I tell ya!” “Huh… really…?”

Those present there involuntarily stared at Gikō’s agitated face.

IV-2

Gikō, suddenly subjected to the group’s collective gaze, flushed crimson in his adorable face yet immediately continued. “It’s true!” “I saw it clear as day!” “And he was gettin’ beaten with a whip too!” No one responded. “But... but Kurokō’s unfazed.” “He was happily lettin’ himself get beaten.” “Grinning and talkin’ to Yukiko-chan while takin’ those lashes, I tell ya…”

Having said that, Gikō tilted his head suspiciously. Of course, there was no way for Senji—who had just heard this—or the other troupe members to comprehend the cause of that strange ecstasy. Ecstasy—indeed, it was a terrifying pleasure. Yet within Yukiko’s beautiful body, the ecstatic state born from Kurokichi’s grueling training—a clash of blood and flesh and bone—vividly revived beneath the whip slicing through air, drawing her into a honeyed dream. And still Kurokichi rejoiced beneath this wildly lashing whip.

He felt yet another surge of desire at the sight of the beautiful wild beast raging before his eyes. When this tempestuous frenzy of a dance subsided, there remained only caresses falling like rain. When Kurokichi felt Yukiko’s sweaty, soft palm—its base indented like dimples—against his shoulder, her warm, breathless breast pressed against his chest. Of course, this was through the thin flesh-colored undergarment, but……. Kurokichi, finding his own ugly face reflected in Yukiko’s eyes brought perilously close to his, instinctively averted his gaze. But when he thought that within the pupils of his own reflected face, Yukiko was mirrored once more, he found himself wanting to peer into them again.

“Yukiko-chan…”

After muttering this under his breath, he hugged her with all his strength. But no matter how much strength he poured into it—no matter how much—Yukiko’s body was so firm and supple, brimming with resilient elasticity, that he feared she might not feel a thing….

—Such games were conducted in the deepest shadows, unbeknownst to anyone. And yet another ecstasy unfolded before the eyes of the audience. That was their acrobatic act. When the narrated jinta music concluded in one full sweep—greeted by whirlwind applause from the audience—Kurokichi appeared onstage hand in hand with Yukiko, both clad in form-fitting pink flesh-colored undergarments and draped in black velvet mantles trimmed with decorative patterns.

Then, taking off that black velvet mantle with a flash of its crimson lining, they each grasped one of the ropes dangling from either end of the tent’s ceiling. By the time this was seen, the two were already nearly parallel, smoothly ascending as if being sucked upward. At the ends of those ropes, simple swings—so characteristic of a circus troupe—hung one by one from between the log beams spread out like a spider’s web, each suspended with red and white braided ropes.

While the audience was watching such things, the nimble pair had already each climbed up to their swings. At the same time, the assistants in the attic hurriedly wound up the ropes they had climbed, while far below on the stage, the familiar spiel of Senji—dressed as a clown—reached intermittently even to the two suspended at a considerable distance apart within the tent’s space.

IV-3 “Ahem—ladies and gentlemen… this time, a life-risking grand adventure… leaping from swing to swing… should that beautiful young lady succeed in catching him, a round of applause… is what we humbly request!”

While listening to the fragmented announcement, Kurokichi peered down at the distant stage below, where Senji the clown was gesturing comically and exuding charm, while in his place, about three stagehands clad in spirited happi coats and carrying a rescue net were emerging. Kurokichi unconsciously rubbed the greasy sweat that had formed on his palm against the area around his thigh on the flesh-colored undergarment, over and over. (If I fall, that's it.)

The rescue net was, of course, merely in name. This ostentation, though of little real use to Kurokichi, proved thoroughly effective in exciting the audience.

Kurokichi glanced briefly in Yukiko’s direction, then silently adjusted his breathing and began swinging the swing as if counting one, two. As the swings gradually grew wider, the log-built cabin began emitting a dull creaking sound from nowhere in particular.

(Oh—)

The moment the entire cabin seemed to lurch violently, Kurokichi’s body became a pink mass of flesh and was flung into the air. The mass somersaulted cleanly midair—and in that instant had already transferred to Yukiko’s swing. It was an instantaneous feat so swift that a pink streak still lingered in the backs of the audience’s eyes. By the time the audience—as if suddenly remembering—began stirring and sending up fierce applause, Kurokichi was already tightly clasped between Yukiko’s warm breasts, listening to the violent pounding of his own heartbeat.

As the applause finally subsided, the two bodies on the swing moved with extreme slowness and care, tangled together—but when the entanglement soon unraveled, Yukiko wrapped her legs around the swing’s rope and lowered herself, while at the tip of her pale white hand, Kurokichi hung dangling by his feet.

And then, as Yukiko’s hips wriggled with subtle undulations, the perfectly synchronized pair of conjoined bodies—forgetting even the pain in their necks—began swaying above the heads of the audience straining to look up.

(If Yukiko’s crossed legs were to come undone—) (If Yukiko were to let go of her hands—)

In the chests of the audience who had entertained such thoughts, a death-like tension toward the next moment seeped in with a creeping chill.

That was not entirely a groundless fear. Yukiko—this beautiful beast—felt an unknowable allure in blood. (What if she impulsively let go?) Even Kurokichi sometimes felt a terror akin to his blood throughout his body scrambling inward at such pallid premonitions. When he thought this, greasy sweat oozed forth on the ankle firmly gripped by Yukiko’s hand, slipping slickly until he felt on the verge of plummeting into the void.

(If it’s for Yukiko-chan, I wouldn’t mind dying.)

Meanwhile, those very feelings were battling within his chest, trying to kick away the terror.

But it was okay— Yukiko clenched her teeth tightly, her cute face flushed crimson as she gripped Kurokichi’s feet. (If I were to fail onstage, it would be better to die as I am.) This innate acrobatic temperament had seized Yukiko’s tense little chest—fortunately leaving no room for other emotions—.

V

This anxious, clammy, and oppressive atmosphere was, in the end, but one byproduct brewed by this life-risking acrobatic feat.

As the audience, each gripped by their own terror, clenched hands full of sweat, in the air of the tent, the swing constructed from their bodies began to sway wider and wider, like a pendulum.

“Timing it just right—when this young lady here releases her grip, the very instant the boy slices through the air to leap over to that swing there—a one-in-a-thousand…” This was the same announcement Senji had delivered earlier, but the audience—determined not to miss that critical instant—followed the swing’s arc with unblinking eyes, craning their necks left and right. The sound of someone gulping saliva reached his ears, and at that very moment—when Kurokichi slipped from Yukiko’s grasp and was hurled into the air—the audience’s breath seemed to stop in unison.

Kurokichi’s body flew with terrifying force, grazing the high roof of the cabin like an arrow, and as soon as it twisted midair, it splendidly returned to the original swing. It was indeed a momentary event, but Kurokichi felt a strong, strong attachment to this life-risking adventure. He found the feeling of slicing through the air and flying in that moment to be inexplicably, delightfully pleasant. Perhaps it was a perverse pleasure—but—.

Gasping and holding his breath as he was hurled into the air, the entire multicolored cabin far below—resembling a toy box—swiftly flipped over, leaving him alone. Half-absorbed, he leapt onto the opposite swing when suddenly—as if drenched—sweat gushed out all at once. His heart floundered through his veins, colliding wildly in every direction as it raced. In this tension taut as steel wire—in himself flying breathlessly through death’s narrow margin—he felt an intense, vision-blurring ecstasy that rivaled even Yukiko’s caresses.

When leaping alone toward Yukiko’s swing, it wasn’t so bad—but on the return, when Yukiko seized his feet and swung him vigorously while he hung upside down, all mental faculties—memory, thought, and the like—were utterly cast aside. And he—with a head utterly hollow, nerves quivering in the void that tore at his entire body the moment he had been hurled—found Kurokichi’s innate twisted temperament harmonized with a bottomless charm that felt as though his heart were being ripped out, leaving him utterly intoxicated.

However, lately—for some reason—whenever he finished this acrobatic act, Kurokichi would again sit alone pensively in the corner of the dressing room, lost in thought as he used to. (How uncanny...)

Kurokichi muttered. Lately, during that acrobatic act, the moment he broke free from Yukiko’s grip and leapt toward the opposite swing, Yukiko’s smiling face would suddenly float before his eyes. Of course, when leaping toward Yukiko, seeing her face wouldn’t be strange in itself—but even when he was turned completely away from her, risking his life mid-flight, Yukiko’s face would indeed float through the tent’s air like a phantom, however faintly.

(How strange...) Kurokichi muttered this again and looked across the dressing room—and there, as if timed perfectly, Yukiko was passing by. “You need something?”

Perhaps mistaking that she had been called, she approached while brushing her tousled bobbed hair back. Her body—clinging tightly to her form, wrapped in a flesh-colored undergarment, voluptuous and firm—sinuously undulated with each step, once more capturing Kurokichi’s gaze.

V-II “It’s not like I called you or anything...”

Kurokichi found it unbearably delightful that Yukiko had taken notice of even his brief mutterings and gone out of her way to come to him. “What were you saying just now?” “I was just muttering ‘How strange…’ to myself.” “Why is it strange? What—” “When you put it like that, it’s hard to explain… but it’s something a little strange.” “What on earth… Oh, fine then. How mean—you don’t want to tell little old me, do you? Fine, have it your way.”

Yukiko said this in a nasal voice, sinuously undulating her voluptuous body as she pouted petulantly. Kurokichi would sometimes whip himself and laugh with delight. Before he could even wonder whether the young beautiful demon possessed such splendid technique, he found himself drowning in her sensual allure.

“I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you. There’s nothing I can’t tell you, Yukiko-chan… I… I see your face.” “My face?” “Yeah—when I’m flying through the air on that swing. Maybe it’s what they call a phantom.” “Well, at times like that... I’m so focused I can’t think of anything at all.”

“Well, I’m absorbed too. But it floats hazily before my eyes. So that’s why I said, ‘How strange...’” “That’s strange… What kind of face was I making? At that time—”

It was such a girlish question. Kurokichi twisted his body and peered at Yukiko’s face while “It’s this face.” “Your skin is white as snow, your eyes like lacquer, your lips redder and more adorable than camellia buds…” Kurokichi lined up all the flowery phrases he knew: “As if your dimple were sucking in my fingertip…”

As he said this, he poked her plump cheek with his finger. “It hurts—you know!”

Yukiko scrunched her face in an exaggerated show of pain, yet even so, she giggled—softly, happily—her laughter bubbling up despite herself. “This beautiful face seems to have taken over my head.”

Once again, Kurokichi continued, deliberately keeping a straight face. “I don’t know. Flattering me won’t work, you know.”

With that, Yukiko ran off toward the stage, laughing. Kurokichi smiled faintly and stared at Yukiko’s retreating figure—her bobbed hair bouncing buoyantly with each stride—but the moment her form vanished behind the stage curtain, that bizarre phantom once again began to spread through his mind.

(Oh well, I really do think about Yukiko-chan all the time.) Just then, the Jinta music that had been on break began to resound with its familiar frenzy.

(The show must be starting now.) He slapped his thigh once with a smack and, while listening to the rustling footsteps of the audience filtering through, (Alright, time to get ready.)

He muttered under his breath and stood up from the costume trunk he had been sitting on.

“Kuro-chan.”

“Huh?” he turned around to see Yukiko running toward him, her face uncharacteristically tense. “It’s terrible, Kuro-chan. Master’s furious since you’re the only one not there.”

5-3 “What on earth—” “It’s not ‘what on earth’—! It’s terrible! Master’s, you know—that ring you’re aware of? The gold one he always wears, you know. They say it’s missing—since it was definitely there until just now, they’re insisting it must’ve been dropped somewhere backstage. We have to search before the show starts—it’ll definitely disappear otherwise. We’ve all been searching frantically until now, you know.” “And then you’re the only one not here, so Master doesn’t seem amused…”

“But since they couldn’t find it no matter what, Master got all worked up—and now that the show’s starting, you’d better go check right away, you know.” “Even if you say that—no one came to get me, so how would I know?—”

“Saying that now won’t help—the only one who knows you’re here is me, you know—” With this, Yukiko laughed slyly. “What… So Yukiko-chan, you didn’t tell me on purpose…?” “That’s cruel.” “It’s not like that. Just go see for yourself, you know.”

(She’s a cruel one. Why wouldn’t she tell me? Even though she knows full well what happens when Master gets angry…) He thought this, but after Yukiko had spoken, he found himself unable to muster the will to resist the words flowing from her damp, vividly colored lips. “Yeah, I’ll go look…” Having said just that, Kurokichi choked back the rest of his words and started walking. (That thing—he’d always treasured it ridiculously. If it really was gone, he’d surely take it out on me horribly.)

As Kurokichi walked，even he himself felt his innate gloom intensifying.

When he went to look, there in the corner of the room sat the Master, sullenly dusting off his silk hat in preparation for the stage. And in that vicinity, performers whose turns were still some time off bustled about the costume room and preparation room—though these were merely partitioned off with simple curtains—as if to proclaim their earnest searching. (This isn’t good.) He saw how roughly the Master handled the silk hat—the dusting motions so violent they resembled striking.

(He’s in a really foul mood.)

he intuited.

Kurokichi, trying his best not to look toward the Master, furtively searched around. However, since many people had already searched, there was no way it would be found so easily. On the contrary, he felt a chill—whether it was his imagination or not, the Master seemed to occasionally send icy glances his way. “Kuro-kō.” “Did you find it?” “Though it’d be suspicious if you found it now after just starting to search—do you even know what you’re looking for in the first place—?” The Master’s voice was quiet—so quiet it was eerie. But in that quietness lay the Master’s signature brand of sarcasm.

(Here it comes…)

Kurokichi audibly gulped down his saliva.

At the same moment, he stumbled upon an unexpected stroke of luck. “Kuro-kō. Isn’t it your turn? Where the hell are you?”

The voice that had shouted like that from behind the curtain was likely Senji’s. This might have been his own resentment coloring his perception, but it seemed unlikely Senji had called out to help him. Rather, it would have been more accurate to assume Senji—still under the impression Kurokichi hadn’t arrived—had shouted deliberately loud enough for the Master to hear. Be that as it may, in this situation, Senji seemed to Kurokichi like a grateful benefactor.

“Well… I’ll go take care of it.” Having said just that, Kurokichi hastily fled the room while the Master remained silent.

5-4 He hurriedly changed into his stage flesh-colored undergarment and, as usual, was sent off by the jinta’s march to stand onstage with Yukiko—yet his mind kept being stolen away by thoughts of that missing ring.

(If I keep thinking about this and mess up, it'll be disastrous.)

Kurokichi shook his head vigorously to cast off those worries, shot a fleeting glance toward Yukiko, then as always, nimbly climbed hand over hand up the rope to the ceiling swing with practiced ease.

And then, with great care, he mounted the swing and began to sway it one, two times, steadying his mind as he did so. Before his eyes, there was no longer the Master, the ring, or the audience—only a world woven with eerie stripes surged violently back and forth. Yukiko’s swing alone remained: at one moment thinning into a distant needle, then in an instant expanding to fill his entire vision, only to immediately plummet from view like a thread. (Alright—) All of Kurokichi’s blood had been replaced by nerves. His body left the swing.

Everything went dark in an instant—or perhaps he had shut his eyes. The next moment, for some reason, the washroom area in the corner of the hut floated faintly before his vision.

(Oh, something’s shining there.) There was something shining behind that washbasin.

(Ah! The ring.) (I found it!) At that moment, at the edge of his vision, the swing carrying Yukiko tried to streak by like an arrow.

(Damn it!) A terror of dreadful force seeped into his brain like sulfuric acid. With a *gwah—* of a scream that felt like vomiting his heart out, Kurokichi wrenched his body through the air with all his might. Fortunately, his one hand managed to claw onto the swing's edge. *Hah—* He let fall a leaden sigh toward the earth below.

And though he had managed to clamber onto the swing, there was no longer any way he could hang from Yukiko’s hand and leap back to his original swing. “What’s wrong, Kuro-chan…” Even as he tried to respond to Yukiko—who whispered in his ear with unnerving calm—everything inside his body clogged in his chest, unbearably heavy, yet his stomach felt utterly hollow, every ounce of strength vanishing without a trace.

In the end, having given up, Kurokichi clung desperately to the rope that an attentive attendant had lowered for him and, once he descended to the stage, slunk off into backstage as though fleeing. The kind-hearted audience, believing this to be part of the acrobatic feat, applauded with all their might, but to Kurokichi backstage, it rang hollow—as if they were merely mocking him.

Kurokichi walked timidly toward the troupe leader’s room. (No matter how much I get yelled at...) He tried clinging to that thought—but when he saw how Master’s partition curtain quivered faintly, as though trembling under his wrath—he froze mid-step for an instant.

Inside indeed lay the troupe leader’s fire-like fury.

“You fool. Got some nerve slinking back here, huh?” When Kurokichi was immediately shouted at from the outset, his mind instead grew eerily calm.

“Master. I... I found the ring. When I was flying through the air…” “Shut your mouth! You think you could see the damn ground from up there?” “But… but…”

Kurokichi himself thought it dubious, but at this point, there was no other way. "But I definitely saw it. Behind the washbasin..." The Master glared piercingly at Kurokichi and said, "Fine."

Saying that, he left, deliberately making his footsteps resound.

5 no 5 Kurokichi stood frozen in place, dejectedly listening to the sound of the Master’s retreating footsteps. His head grew flushed with a jumble of thoughts, and his eyes—cast down at the cracks in the floorboards—grew inexplicably moist. (This has turned into a real problem...)

He unconsciously rubbed his palms—slick with greasy sweat—against his flesh-colored undergarment. (If only it were really there… No, there’s no way it could be.) I shouldn’t have said such a thing—the regret swelled steadily and relentlessly with each passing moment.

Even into this swamp-like room, the audience’s murmurs and applause would occasionally filter through with a tidal ebb and flow. Suddenly, from beyond the hut, the Jinta’s performance music began. And then, when the clarinet—its notes both melancholy and ephemeral—began to play familiar tunes like *Kokoro wa Okuni o*, each note drilled into him as if teaching them anew, something hot and nameless welled up soundlessly within Kurokichi’s chest as he listened in silent absorption.

He bit his lips hard to suppress the moisture welling in the inner corners of his eyes—moisture brought on by something he had long forgotten. At that moment, a *clatter* sounded from behind him. (Master?) Startled, Kurokichi wiped his eyes and turned around.

There, a dirty gray curtain swayed heavily as if caught by wind, and through a gap of several inches between the curtain’s hem and the floorboards, he could just glimpse a costume box or something similar lying toppled over.

He stared fixedly at the partition curtain. He saw—in that instant he turned around, though it lasted but a fraction of a second—a white hand flicker into motion beyond the small keyhole-shaped tear at the curtain’s center. (Yukiko-chan...) He intuited this.

(Why did she try to peek from there?) He couldn’t help wondering. Clearly, Yukiko had tried to peek by climbing onto a box, which must have tipped over and made that noise. (Was she worried I’d get scolded?) He recalled Yukiko’s lovely crimson lips. (But—) Kurokichi saw Yukiko’s curious eyes—eyes that had worn an unexpectedly calm expression, even a bewitching smile, during that terrifying moment when he had nearly been crushed to pieces—pass swiftly across his retina,

(So she came to see what they'd do to me.) Thus, for the first time since birth, he felt a chill toward Yukiko. (It was true.) If she'd really come out of concern—with the Master gone now—she should've given at least one word of comfort. What's more, Yukiko seemed to take some strange pleasure in beating him from time to time. (Tch—parading that pretty face.)

Kurokichi muttered as though spitting.

“Kuro-kō. “Kuro…” It was the Master. He instinctively started, then hurriedly turned around.

“Kuro-kō, look—found it.” “Weird, ain’t it? For real.”

The Troupe Leader, having said that, thrust his left hand before Kurokichi’s bewildered eyes. On that gnarled, sturdy left hand, at the base of the ring finger, as usual, the gold ring engraved with something gleamed silently.

5 no 6

“Ah… So it was there after all…”

“Found it.” “Kuro-kō, where the hell did you find it?” “That’s good… You see, when I was flying through the air…” “Quit jokin’—I ain’t gettin’ mad no more, so try me—you ain’t no clairvoyant… And there’s no way you coulda seen clear down from that height, ’sides, from up there, the washroom’s in the shadows—can’t see a damn thing…” “W-well, that’s true, but…” (That’s strange… Indeed, just as the Master said—from that ceiling, it should’ve been hidden behind the curtain’s shadow and impossible to see—)

Kurokichi desperately tried to gather his thoughts, but his mind only grew more muddled.

“I don’t know why, but I saw it anyway. In the midst of that haze, only the washroom and the ring... Maybe ’cause I was thinkin’ ’bout the ring nonstop—” “Sounds like some dreamy nonsense you’re spoutin’. So busy thinkin’ ’bout it—” “Yes, that’s right.” “Hunh.” “So…” Kurokichi desperately tried to explain himself, anxious that the Master’s mood—which had finally improved—might sour again if provoked. But how could something even he didn’t fully grasp be understood by the Master?

“So, the moment I thought I’d found it, I completely forgot about the performance and messed up. ...I’m really sorry... I never meant any harm by it...” “Course it is—even if you did it on purpose, you’d be risking your life… Must’ve dropped it when I washed my face…”

While stroking the ring, the Troupe Leader came to a self-satisfied conclusion. “Well, I’ll let it slide for today… But if you go around dreamin’ ’bout women from now on and fall, I won’t have it…” “Huh?!” Kurokichi was startled, wondering if the Master had been referring to the phantom of Yukiko. “Ha ha….” “There, there. Go over there and get ready.” He realized that the Master, in high spirits from having found his ring, had made an uncharacteristic joke.

“Uh… I’m sorry…”

Kurokichi left the Master’s room, keeping his face as expressionless as possible while feigning deference.

"How strange—." "It’s truly a baffling matter." "Both that phantom of Yukiko floating in the sky and now this discovery of the ring—things that should be utterly impossible to see—they flit through my mind precisely when I’m flying through the air in a frenzy, having shaken off all capacity for thought and memory—" "What in the world is this?" Kurokichi had left the Master’s room and made his way to a corner of the backstage area. However, his mind was utterly occupied by those madness-tinged questions, and those very questions now clashed violently, feverishly against each other.

(Am I... dreaming in broad daylight—)

Kurokichi plopped down onto the costume box he always used.

Perhaps because the box was cold, he felt an ice-like terror. (Have I... lost my mind—) There was nothing more terrifying than dwelling so intently on such thoughts. I am of sound mind. And with what evidence can I assert this? Even a madman can think; he can see things. Talking, listening, sleeping, running—.

All these things, as if taunting “Well? How’s this? How’s that?”, thrust Kurokichi himself into a quagmire of terror and anguish.

Six

“Tch... Do whatever the hell you want...” Kurokichi spat out the thick, stagnant words that had congealed in his mouth.

"That I’m—this very me—crazy. Hmph." To tear away the anxiety in his chest, he deliberately raised his voice and mocked himself. However, after speaking aloud so boldly in that empty space, what followed was instead a madness-tinged stillness.

Unable to sit still—he rose from the costume box with a forceful thud, all his momentum concentrated in that single motion—yet still that "anxiety" seemed to cling to his back like some persistent shadow. With nowhere to go, Kurokichi paced back and forth across the corner of the backstage partitioned by a stain-covered waterproof curtain, moving like a bear trapped in its cage. Pacing back and forth in irritation, gripped by a desperate urge to cling to anything—even a straw—like a drowning man.

"If something—some great force—were to embrace me so tightly that my bones creaked and snapped… surely then I’d find peace—" he thought, and then suddenly— (Yukiko)

Her face floated up.

“That’s it. Yukiko-chan...

He muttered involuntarily and stood up. Perhaps from all that pacing, he felt greasy sweat beading on his forehead. Thud—. An abominable shadow once again thrust Kurokichi into the depths of melancholy.

(Lately, Yukiko-chan has been acting a bit strange, hasn’t she? Just now, she came to watch me get scolded by the Master. Not only that—she deliberately didn’t tell me about the missing ring and tried to make him angry…)

One after another, Yukiko’s recent cold-hearted acts floated up.

(Why did Yukiko come to hate me...) When Kurokichi thought this, he was assaulted by an intense emptiness unlike anything he had ever imagined. The terror of that daydream blurred and faded away like an old photograph. Heartbreak—. Kurokichi was aghast. Th-that’s ridiculous… (That can’t be possible…) No matter how much he railed inwardly, his anxiety only swelled—never diminishing.

The very fact that he couldn’t discern why Yukiko was distancing herself from him made the outcome all the more terrifying.

Alright—I'll ask Yukiko-chan. If there are flaws, I'll just fix them.

Kurokichi hurriedly peeked at the stage.

At that very moment, Yukiko was on stage; before the excited audience, her figure—writhing her limbs freely like a white snake—glistened sleek.

Six-Two

The air was disturbed by the rustling applause, and immediately Yukiko returned to the dressing room, her face slightly flushed. “Yukiko-chan, wait…”

Kurokichi waved his hand slightly and called out to stop her. “What do you want?” “Yeah, just a little.” “Just for a bit then.” “And I have to go out again soon, so…” Yukiko sat down on the costume box Kurokichi had been sitting on earlier, with apparent disinterest.

The silver-thread embroidery adorning the waist of her flesh-colored undergarment prickled into Kurokichi’s eyes, quivering. Each time Kurokichi tried to speak, his heart thudded up to his throat, hindering him. “What is this… You called me here yourself.”

“Yukiko-chan… Yukiko-chan really is amazing, huh?”

Kurokichi started as words he hadn’t even considered suddenly tumbled from his mouth. His face burned fiercely. “Ho-ho-ho! What did you think this was about? Going through all that trouble to stop me.” “Disgusting, Kuro-chan.” Yukiko began to rise with an air of utter absurdity.

“W-wait.” Kurokichi, flustered, pulled her back and— “Wait a second—I have something to ask… Yukiko-chan, don’t be angry.” “Why did you start hating me? Why?” He mustered his courage and blurted it out. “Oh my, who said such a thing?”

Her round, glossy black eyes were, if anything, curious.

“Who? No one’s said anything.” “I just... I think that’s how it is.” “Oh, when did I ever say I hated you? There’s no such thing.” “But... even if you don’t say it out loud... I think that’s how it is.” “Sen was really kind to me, wasn’t he? I was better off with Sen.” “Even if everyone called me clumsy, clumsy and laughed at me, Yukiko-chan never laughed at me and always encouraged me.” Kurokichi felt his eyelids growing hot and swollen as he rambled on at his own words.

“That’s just your petty jealousy talking. I stopped praising you, and now that everyone else does—you’ve gotten better, haven’t you?” Yukiko’s face turned ashen and stiffened. “I’d be way happier being praised by you alone than by everyone else.” “Well... I’m ugly.” “I can’t even compare to someone like Gikō.” “But no matter what anyone says... I love you, Yukiko-chan...” “Oh, Kuro-chan—what’s this?” “Hohoho! You’re in love with me? Spouting such grown-up lines.” “Let’s have that little chat then.”

Yukiko, true to her strong-willed nature as a girl who brooked no weakness, stated it as if it meant nothing at all and hurried off to the dressing room, shutting herself inside.

As her retreating figure blurred hazily before him, something hot spilled from Kurokichi’s swollen eyelids and trailed down his cheeks. (To be Yukiko-chan’s husband…)

Such fantasies scattered into a thousand fragments.

In the tears that fell in scattered drops, Yukiko’s unmistakable betrayal began to rake through every corner of his chest like sharp claws.

6-3 “Kuro-chan, what are you thinking about?”

Standing vacantly as if in a daze, Kurokichi—who had been engrossed in the frenzied jinta—startled and turned around. “Oh, it’s just you, Yoshiko. Don’t startle me like that.” “Hohoho! Not Yukiko-chan? How pitiful for you.” The one who had spoken and now laughed like a mischievous child, her whole body shaking, was not Yukiko—whom he had hoped for—but Yoshiko Sonomichi, another young troupe member. “What’s so pitiable about that? That’s…”

“Oh please, I know.” “You had a fight with Yukiko-chan, didn’t you?” “Liar…” “It’s not a lie—I know for sure. I saw it.” “Yukiko-chan’s such a weirdo, isn’t she? I feel so sorry for you now.” “This brat…” (Quit acting all grown-up!)

He tried to say it—but his mouth would no longer obey him.

Kurokichi wanted to stay alone forever in such sorrowful times. When left alone, he could desperately hold back his tears—but when met with gentle words of comfort, they would instead turn into scalding water and course through his chest.

“It’s fine, Yoshiko-chan.” “Thanks.” “It’s nothing.” “Well… if you say so…”

Even as she said this, Yoshiko stood there as if trying to spit out something caught between her molars.

Though Yoshiko Sonomichi had been close with Yukiko, she lacked her striking beauty and was not particularly skilled in performance either; thus Kurokichi—who had fixated solely on Yukiko—had naturally had no interaction with her. But now that he had been compelled to reassess what Yukiko meant to him, Yoshiko’s emergence seemed likely to stir some turmoil in his heart.

6-4

“Kuro-chan” “Yeah.”

“Look, I’m not trying to be mean, but you’d be better off forgetting about someone like Yukiko-chan…” “Why—” “Why… you ask…” “What’s the use in saying something like that?” (Yukiko—I can’t forget her!) “Don’t say unnecessary things.”

Kurokichi spat out brusquely and rapidly. "But...but you're bound to end up miserable anyway!" "You're spouting nonsense! I'm doomed to misery regardless—it's not like I'm as pretty as Yoshiko..."

“Oh, Kuro-chan, you shouldn’t say such things! Are you doubting me? There’s no need to be so resentful.”

Yoshiko, too, unconsciously grew excited by her own words and widened her eyes. “You don’t know, do you? Boys really don’t notice the little things, do they? You don’t know about Yukiko-chan’s terrifying habit…” (Yukiko-chan’s terrifying habit—) Kurokichi dimly felt as though something was dawning on him. “That ‘terrifying habit’…” “Yukiko-chan is so cruel—she has such a pretty face, yet you haven’t noticed?”

(So it was true after all.)

Kurokichi silently shook his head. “It’s really awful—mice， frogs， snakes， she tears them apart and kills them without batting an eye.” “But even she herself sometimes tells me—just me—‘I need to see blood sometimes， or I get all restless—it’s terrifying.’” “And—and—she says it definitely gets worse once a month—” “That’s when she whips you—uh， no! No lie! I know for sure! And afterward—‘Ah， so refreshed!’ she says! It’s awful， I tell you—terrifying!” “She just adores seeing people beaten to a pulp—says when she sees them collapsed with blood oozing everywhere， she wants to cling to them—that one might end up killing someone someday， I tell you.”

“And then she said this too: ‘Using a pistol to kill someone? How stupid—if it were me, I’d carve them up with a dagger. Isn’t that something?’” “And Yukiko-chan—precisely because she’s beautiful—when she says such things with her eyes gleaming so, so… Kuro-chan, Kuro-chan, I’m telling you…”

Kurokichi silently left the side of this talkative Yoshiko and, making the ill-fitted backstage floorboards click faintly underfoot, wandered aimlessly toward the face-show stage.

Beneath the face-show stage, crowds of the town’s children chattered aimlessly while gazing up at the gaudy painted scenery.

On that gaudy painted scenery, Yukiko and Kurokichi’s entangled acrobatic poses were depicted with such splendor that they looked like entirely different people.

(No matter how much I’m beaten—even if I’m killed—I still love Yukiko-chan.)

“Tch!”

Kurokichi shook his head and brushed away the image of Yoshiko’s chattering face floating before his eyes. Yoshiko herself—going on and on badmouthing Yukiko—seemed far closer to a devil. (What’s Yukō even yammering about?)

He shrugged his shoulders unconsciously.

Seven Had that young demonic enchantress Yukiko—she who once scattered tempestuous caresses without restraint—already lost interest in this insect, this Kurokichi? Or was it merely Yukiko’s signature brand of relentless teasing? Before Kurokichi’s mind could resolve this crucial—this most crucial—problem, it was plunged into a far more terrifying chaos beyond earthly comprehension that had manifested before his very eyes.

――A Dream Floating in the Sky――

That was it. Because of his entanglement with Yukiko, that aerial vision had temporarily faded like an old photograph. Now it revived. It revived with raw,vivid reality. During daytime performances before crowds—as he flew through the air—it began with Yukiko’s face suddenly surfacing in his mind.This led him to “discover” a ring that should have been utterly invisible. That “phantom dream in broad daylight”—the very one that had made Kurokichi question his sanity—now exploded behind his eyelids with terrifying clarity as he soared.

Whether Kurokichi kept the matter with Yukiko close to his heart or not, he had to fly through the air at least once a day. The moment he flew through the air—it was a moment where not a single nerve could be wasted, taut as a steel wire stretched to its limit, crystalline clarity—a single moment of selfless transcendence. (And yet—why was he seeing such carefree dreams?)

This was a problem that didn’t seem likely to be resolved in any hurry. (Have I developed a stain in my brains?) Even if he seriously considered such things, it didn’t seem absurd. That vision—something unimaginable would come to mind. Nameless weeds sprouted vigorously, burst into an enormous crimson bloom, and before one could blink, their petals scattered like blood dripping drop by drop—or else he found himself darting through a garden of fantastically shaped boulders and rocks, swift as a dragonfly. Or—ah, when did I become a mole? Into the pitch-black, tepid depths of the earth—I must keep digging on and on…

But if these were merely such dreams, things might still be bearable.

Seven-2

If they were all such trivial things, there would be nothing to fear. It would merely be dismissed as a dream—a phantom——. But what about that "discovery of the ring"? Facts that absolutely, categorically, undeniably should not be visible were materializing with vivid clarity behind his eyelids. That phantom—akin to an eerie cloud, emerging in the fleeting instant he shook off even thoughts of Yukiko, which he could never forget waking or sleeping—forcefully dragged Kurokichi into a four-dimensional universe.

To put it plainly, before he knew it, it had become “prophetic dreams.”

Looking back, the discovery of the ring was indeed the genesis of those "prophetic dreams." If dreams—those things—are the regurgitation of memory, then the visions floating in the sky were dreams of the future...

……One autumn day. As always, in that instant, Kurokichi—with Yukiko assisting him—shot out like a bullet into the void-like sky, freed from all supporting structures.

Behind his eyelids, the scene of the troupe achieving a roaring success in the next town was vividly projected.

And when they opened the first day in the next town, there was an eerily immense turnout. As the bustling first day came to a close, within the tent that had abruptly fallen silent, the Master’s uncharacteristically cheerful laughter resounded like the return of a long-awaited spring. Truly, when there’s a full house, everyone feels buoyant.

“Alright, everyone. —Have you all gathered?”

The Master, stroking his prized mustache over his stage-attired tails, surveyed the troupe members. From somewhere, cheap sake flasks had been brought in, and once again the tent buzzed with commotion, growing lively for a time. Under the yellowed electric light, as the intoxicated clown stomped across creaking floorboards and began dancing, the men in marked coats, the silk-hatted gentlemen, and the women in flesh-colored undergarments—their bodies exuding a sweet-and-sour stench—suddenly filled the hut like twisted clay dolls wound by invisible hands. Screaming lewd cries, they unfurled a hellish picture scroll.

Whenever intense laughter erupted by his ears, Kurokichi would knock his head repeatedly. He had been sitting cross-legged in the corner of the hut since earlier. But his eyes were bloodshot. (It’s me—it’s exactly as I saw the other day…) The bizarre scenes unfolding one after another were nothing but rehearsals of the dream floating in the sky—exactly as he had seen it. Even Old Genjirō—who normally wouldn’t so much as touch a cup for fear of trembling—was now lost in drunken ecstasy——.

A cold sweat coursed down his spine.

The bizarre dance between Yukiko and Gikō—which might have been meant as a taunt—was, in another sense, a nightmare of swarming, overwhelming pressure. The bitter liquor gulped down in panic gurgled in his throat. (Which is real…?) (Am I dreaming…?)

Faced with a simple question, he came to an abrupt standstill. Unbearable—absolutely unbearable—. Kurokichi frantically, desperately tried to drown his nerves in alcohol…….

Seven-3

Kurokichi tasted fear for the first time in flying through the air. Simultaneously, he felt an unfathomable fascination.

However, the next “prophetic dream” he saw was, ominously, a vision of the troupe’s performances becoming utterly deserted. Moreover, it matched perfectly, without a single iota of difference—as if a photographic positive had been printed from a negative. They could only draw spectators—as if the troupe members now outnumbered the audience.

When flying through the air, Kurokichi clenched his hands, gritted his teeth, and flew with desperate strength. (I’ve got to make it happen again somehow.) But—what on earth was happening? The ‘prophetic dreams’ would no longer bring news of happiness. (Could it be because I caught a glimpse of what was to come?)

Kurokichi shook his head.

(Even so—ain’t my business.)

He shrugged his shoulders unconsciously out of habit. “If this keeps up, we’re disbanding!” The Master grew even more ill-tempered.

Yukiko, Yoshiko, Gikō, Senji—every last one of them—felt a dark shadow descend as they spoke less and less. Old Genjirō too, airing out the seat cushions, stared blankly at the sky.

(Ain't my business, I tell you.) Kurokichi roared inwardly, but still felt anxious.

(I only ever see the same dream as before...) "That’s what’s wrong!" He felt as if he’d heard such a voice somewhere and shuddered.

“Is everyone here—” The Master, for reasons unknown, gathered the troupe members and broke the silence.

“You’re all here—” “As you all know, lately, it’s not working out at all.” “I can’t keep this up anymore—if we try in the next town and it still doesn’t work out… then we’re disbanding……”

He couldn’t hear what came after that. “Disband!”

This single word was enough.

Although they had vaguely anticipated it, everyone was shocked anew.

Seven-4

“Disband!”

Kurokichi suddenly felt as though he had been struck and knocked forward. (I have to part with Yukiko—) When he thought this, the disbandment itself wasn’t particularly terrifying, but the fact that he would have to part with Yukiko was unbearable. His clenched fist trembled violently without warning. (Goddamn it! No matter what…) He resolved that even if he had to bite into a stone, he would see a “good dream.”

Even as frenzied jinta music erupted around him, Kurokichi still stood utterly alone backstage. “Kuro-chan, hang in there…” Before he knew it, Yukiko—now changed into her stage costume—seemed just as struck by the word “disband!”, her face slightly more rigid than usual as she tapped Kurokichi’s shoulder.

Kurokichi abruptly raised his face. “Yeah…” Though he was normally the type to feel a spreading warmth wherever she touched him—even from a mere tap on the shoulder—today he merely gave a single nod.

“Yukiko-chan, let’s give it our all.” “Yeah.” “Having to part with Yukiko-chan... it’s just too painful…” “Oh, what are you even saying… If we give it our all and there’s still no crowd, what else can we do?” “But…” “If you’re going to mope like that, why don’t you just fall and turn into bloody pulp once and for all…” “Heh—if I’m gonna fall and die alone? No way—I’ll drag you down with me, Yukiko-chan—” “Oh—hmph, that’s just how it is anyway—”

Her eyes glinted sharply as she tossed a characteristically flippant parting remark over her shoulder and briskly walked away. Kurokichi remained standing as ever, closing his eyes against the intense temptation—akin to violent hatred—that surged through him at the sight of Yukiko's retreating figure, the unnervingly writhing swell of her hips. (No matter what... I will see a good dream...) When he closed his eyes, the maddening jinta music raged all around him...

× When his turn came, Kurokichi donned his snugly fitting flesh-colored undergarment, offered a flowing bow to the scant handful of spectators, then fixed his gaze intently on the swing hanging from the ceiling. And even as he nimbly climbed the rope, his mind—no, his entire body—was filled with thoughts of the "good dream." Before long, the swing began to groan and shake the entire hut, its movements growing increasingly erratic.

“Ah!” The blood drained away in an instant—Kurokichi leapt into empty space. “Ah—” By the time some audience members groaned low in their throats, Kurokichi’s body had already fully transferred to Yukiko’s swing, pausing for a breath. (It’s no use—) Kurokichi wiped his pallid forehead with one hand. (No good... No good...)

For some reason, today of all days, that prophetic vision—the one that should have appeared in the sky—wouldn’t materialize. (Have I... lost the power of prophecy...?) The “ominous prophetic vision” he had so feared failed to appear for Kurokichi today—he who now found himself filled with anticipation—for reasons unknown.

(Alright, one more time.) Entangled in the swing with her toes twisted through its ropes, suspended from Yukiko’s soft hands as she dangled below, swaying limply through the sky amidst the churning tide of his blood, Kurokichi gasped repeatedly while his thoughts raced on. “Guh…” Leaving behind the sinister gurgle of Yukiko’s throat—taut as if about to burst—far behind him in an instant, Kurokichi spun around and seized his original swing. After a breath, he hoisted himself up with a twist of his hips to sit properly on the swing—and all at once, sweat drenched him like a torrent, summoned by the clamorous applause rising from far below.

But Kurokichi forgot even to wipe his sweat. (It’s no use—) The "dream" did not appear. His field of vision turned utterly dark, like a stage plunged into blackout. All the more for that, he wanted to glimpse the "next scene." (Auspicious or ominous—) Eventually, as if suddenly aware of himself, he nimbly descended the rope and returned to the dressing room—yet even then, that single thought consumed his entire mind.

7-5

The day waned, fires were kindled, and then one by one the lamps went out. The venue had already cleared out, and the surroundings were steeped in profound silence. At some uncertain hour—though he had once crawled into bed—Kurokichi rose up abruptly. Kurokichi’s eyes held an uncanny gleam, as though possessed by some entity. No matter how desperately he strained to sleep, he could not—the troupe’s future, this “tomorrow” that held such immense significance for both himself and Yukiko—would it prove auspicious or ominous—?

If auspicious, then so be it. If ominous, then as ominous…

(Even if this troupe disbands, I won’t part from Yukiko…) (If we must part, then all the more reason to kill Yukiko-chan…) Even having steeled himself to that extent, still "tomorrow" gnawed at his mind. Normally, tomorrow’s affairs would be beyond anyone’s control—but whether fortunately or unfortunately, Kurokichi had acquired the means to glimpse the future—a blasphemy against that terrifying “future,” one might say—through some twist of circumstance.

……Unable to endure any longer, Kurokichi stealthily slipped out from under the covers and, muffling every sound, began climbing toward the ceiling of the high hut.

When he finally climbed up completely and looked around, the scenery there was entirely different from what he was accustomed to. The utterly deserted audience seats lay bleakly stark, while overhead, the seams of the tent canopy flapped noisily in the night wind.

Far below his gaze, on the stage that resembled a valley floor, a yellowish five-candlepower electric bulb was merely tracing a faint circle.

Kurokichi lowered the hoisted swing, nimbly leaped onto it, and with each measured motion—as if counting—he mustered his strength and began to swing. The arc traced by the swing gradually expanded, and as acceleration increased, the hushed tent hut creaked with a startling noise. Abruptly, when he peered down below, Yukiko and Yoshiko—still in their nightclothes—were waving their hands, mouths flapping soundlessly as if trying to speak; he couldn’t tell when they’d woken. Though Kurokichi didn’t understand what this meant for him, he gave one firm nod, closed his eyes this time, and continued pouring more strength into the swing.

“Hah!” Leaving behind a groan-like shout, he shot out like a bullet into the dark hut’s sky. “Agh!” Kurokichi had committed a terrible blunder—though an assistant would normally have lowered the opposite swing properly beforehand, there was no reason for one to be there now, and so absorbed was he in his thoughts that he himself had completely forgotten to lower the swing he was supposed to leap to. (Damn it!)

In the instant he thought this, at the edge of his vision, one end of the hoisted swing glinted sharply. “Gag—!”

With every fiber of his being, he twisted his body in the void—but such efforts proved utterly futile; it was already too late.

Kurokichi’s body let out a ghastly death scream, spun wildly through the air in several rapid rotations, then plummeted straight down through the eerie hut space with terrifying force.

Yoshiko “Ah…” With only that faint utterance escaping her lips, Yoshiko’s face drained of color. She staggered backward and collapsed into a seated position, burying her head between her knees—even Yukiko momentarily flinched and looked away.

Truly, it was a tremendous sound—closer to being slammed against the earth than a mere fall. Kurokichi did not even let out a groan. The next instant, Yukiko ran up breathlessly. Staring fixedly at Kurokichi’s mangled form splayed out like paper pasted to the sandy arena ground, she cradled his upper body gently and murmured in a low voice: “Kuro-chan… Kuro-chan… That was incredible… You know… Truly incredible…”

And with her mouth slightly parted as if dreaming, she was gazing up at the towering hut ceiling.

8

After struggling endlessly in a pitch-black hell of needles, when he abruptly came to his senses, Kurokichi discovered himself lying in a corner of the charity hospital, reeking of disinfectant. (I... haven't died yet...?) In the haze between dream and reality, thinking this, the first thing he noticed was that his entire body—face, head, and all—was wrapped in thick bandages, save for his left eye and the area around his mouth. Then, before his eyes could adjust, the forgotten pain suddenly revived with a dull throbbing, surging over him until once more Kurokichi was dragged into an endless coma.

……And then again—how much time had passed?—like smoke, (Yukiko’s face…) As it surfaced, he opened his eyes with a start—but his body remained as if nailed to the bed, not moving an inch. Pain and a chill-like agony, riding the pulses of his blood, seeped all the way to the tips of his toes with each throbbing beat……. (Yukiko-chan…)

Even if he muttered like delirious rambling, all he could manage was a faint twitch at the corner of his lips. With only his left eye—its vision dulled—fixedly staring at the hospital room ceiling where even distances remained indistinct, there suddenly appeared within it a woman’s face, her cheeks slightly stiffened. (Yukiko-chan!) Her haze-clouded pupils fluttered rapidly in frustration, yet still appeared only as if seen through a sheer veil. Then the entire hospital room suddenly warped with a sickly warmth, and as a single hot tear was absorbed into the bandage at the edge of his eye, everything around him plunged into darkness.

(Oh... was I crying—) As he thought this, he stared fixedly at the woman’s face, but whether due to his eye, it didn’t seem to be Yukiko.

(A nurse—) It also seemed like a nurse—but that was a face he had seen somewhere before. (If she's a nurse... I shouldn't know her...) When he closed his eyes, the very act of thinking itself grew sluggish. Beside the ear of his closed-eyed self, that “woman” seemed to whisper something faintly, but he couldn’t make out what it was, and even attempting to “listen—” felt excruciating. His entire body was feverishly painful, as though riddled with cracks…….

……Had over a week passed since then? Kurokichi, who had originally possessed an unusually robust constitution, was visibly and rapidly recovering. And when he regained the ability to speak, the first thing he asked about was, of course, news of the Far Eastern Circus Troupe. However, the reply that the doctor on his rounds answered in a pitying whisper once again kicked Kurokichi down into a deep, deep abyss. “That circus troupe has disbanded…”

The doctor’s words inflicted upon him an even greater, more crushing disappointment than when he had plummeted headfirst from that hut’s heights. “Doctor… will I survive…” “Of course you will. You were extremely lucky—you fell onto sand, after all.”

“……” “What’s wrong? Does it hurt?” “No... I should’ve died. That would’ve been cleaner… Now that the Far Eastern’s disbanded, I can’t even earn my keep…” (More than anything, I have to part with Yukiko-chan) “And... and I can’t even read properly... No one’s gonna hire me...” Even after the doctor had moved on to other patients, Kurokichi continued muttering to himself, his voice barely audible. (But... Wait—)

Who on earth had me hospitalized here?

(Master?—) But there was no way Master would have that kind of extra money—if he did, he surely wouldn’t have disbanded us……. (Who could it be—) Of course Kurokichi hadn’t saved his meager salary; he’d spent nearly all of it to win Yukiko’s favor. (Who could this kind person be…) At the same time, (Could it be that woman I saw in my half-dreaming state at first—)

he had hit upon the idea—but who could that 'someone' be— (If it's Yukiko-chan...)

His heart raced at the thought, but for one thing, that face didn’t seem to be Yukiko’s, and besides, that spendthrift Yukiko couldn’t possibly have had that kind of money.

However, even though he didn't know who it was, Kurokichi began regaining some vigor. (There's someone protecting me...) The moment this thought came, precisely because he had been raised in that dismal circus troupe, he felt an intensely warm sensation within himself.

And he wanted to express his heartfelt gratitude to that person. Despite his grievous injuries, his heart felt uncharacteristically buoyant—.

8 no 2

As usual, once again, the doctor on his rounds came in. “How are you feeling…” Behind thick myopic glasses, the old doctor smiled gently.

“Yes, I’m doing much better.” “I see, that’s good… It’s progressing well.” “When can I be discharged, I wonder…” “Not yet.” “You mustn’t rush things.” “Take it easy for now.”

“But… but I don’t have any money…” “Ha ha ha, you don’t need to worry about that—this is a charity hospital, so—” “Charity hospital—?” Kurokichi didn’t quite understand what those words meant, but— (So it’s not a place that requires much money after all—) he was able to deduce. And then, “Well…”

to the doctor, who was starting to leave, “Doctor, do you know of any circus troupes around here?” “Hmph, why do you ask?”

The old doctor turned back. “Well… once I leave here, I’ll need to eat…”

Kurokichi looked up pleadingly at the eyes behind the glasses. "You still intend to perform those acrobatics... with that one leg—" “Wh-what?!” Kurokichi was aghast. “One leg!”

These words were truly a bolt from the blue. Kurokichi, seized by some incomprehensible chilling dread, trembled violently and, forgetting even the pain in his arm, began stroking himself from his chest to his stomach, then from his stomach to his waist. And from his waist… ah, from his waist… no matter how much he stroked downward, when his hand reached that point, it would thud down onto the bedsheet.

Ah, (I have no right leg!)

(My right leg—it’s gone!) Beneath layers of thickly wound bandages, his forehead grew clammy with sweat as he felt blood drain from his entire body. The air grew stifling around him, as if poison gas had been released… (I’ve become a horrible cripple)

How in the world was he supposed to endure this fleeting existence from now on? In the face of his own fate—too cruel to bear—even his tears had dried up. If they were going to amputate it anyway, they might as well go all at once—cut off the left leg too, the right hand, the left hand, slice them all off completely... After all, this me could no longer fly through that sky... That’s right, I could no longer fly through that sky.

And then... In Kurokichi's mind, the longing for that acrobatics' mysterious sensation of the sky swirled like a torrent, bursting forth in all directions. (Just once more—if I could just experience that ecstasy one more time, exactly as my heart desires...)

八ノ三 By the next day, Kurokichi had completely resigned himself to the loss of his other leg—and yet,

(I want to fly through the sky!) This desire grew even more intense. That deep, resonant thrum reverberating through his entire being—the exhilarating pulse of the swing! The moment he thought 'Ah!'—the ecstatic intoxication of soaring through the void’s nothingness!

And then—suddenly floating up in the depths of his eyes: "Tomorrow’s Dream"! How alluring that must be— Kurokichi had already become a captive of these “Daylight Phantom Visions”—forbidden to ordinary minds. Having lost the pillars of his entire body—why was it only when suspended in midair that he could behold such an overwhelming, yet bone-chillingly precise vision of "Tomorrow"—? This was a psychological phenomenon not easily unraveled. However, for Kurokichi, whether it was hypnosis or sorcery made no difference at all. Like an opium addict, he didn’t care what consequences it might bring. If only he could drown himself completely in it—that would have been bliss.

Kurokichi spent the entire day staring fixedly at the stain-covered ceiling, thinking of nothing but that. Click, click, click... The footsteps echoing through the hallway came to an abrupt halt right in front of Kurokichi’s hospital room, “Are you feeling better already…?” The voice was unmistakably a woman’s—the very timbre that lingered in Kurokichi’s eardrums. “Yukiko!” Preoccupied with his one leg and flying through the sky, the name he’d nearly forgotten came jolting back to him. Almost simultaneously, as the door was pushed open, the one who entered quietly was not the Yukiko he had expected but the figure of that Yoshiko.

“Yoshiko...?” Kurokichi visibly deflated and let his half-raised upper body fall back. “Kuro-chan, how are you...”

“Yeah…”

"But to recover this quickly… that’s good then…" "Yeah…" "…Are you still feeling unwell—" "Nah… I’m all better now."

“That’s good to hear, then.”

“Yukiko-chan—”

“Yukiko-chan?” Yoshiko made a briefly displeased face but immediately assumed a nonchalant air.

“Yukiko-chan said that once we disband, she’s going to Tokyo with Gikō to stay at her uncle’s place.” “With Gikō—”

Kurokichi felt his chest flare up with heat. The thought of Yukiko and that affected, pasty-faced Gikō riding the train as if they were newlyweds sent a dizzying discomfort surging through him, his heartbeat quickening into a pounding rhythm. “Yukiko-chan is being bad, don’t you think? She could’ve visited you at least once…” Yoshiko said this with deliberate suggestiveness and peered into Kurokichi’s face. (Tch, what the hell are you talking about…)

The words rose to the tip of his tongue, yet never found voice. His mouth twitched spasmodically, contorting, and for some reason, tears began to stream down.

“Oh my, what’s wrong…”

"N-no, it’s just… my leg hurt a bit…"

Kurokichi turned his face away.

It wasn't his leg—the pain was in his chest, so intense it felt like it would burst...

After some time, Kurokichi finally turned back around. “Yocchan… I’m sorry. You came to visit me sometimes, didn’t you… Aren’t you going anywhere?” “Oh, don’t be silly! It’s only natural I’d come visit you… I felt sorry for you, Kuro-chan, and also—” Those final words trailed off unspoken, yet their meaning came through all too clearly. “Yocchan… thanks for your kindness… but I’m… I’m even uglier now than before… and on top of that, a cripple with one leg… heh heh heh…”

Kurokichi's voice came out flat and hoarse. "I know... That's why I pitied you even more..." "Hmph. Still alive, huh?" "It's fine—it's fine. I like your feelings—your face, your lame leg—"

Yoshiko, even she, flushed slightly and turned away. A few stray strands of hair clinging to her flushed earlobes trembled faintly. Kurokichi was half-dumbfounded by Yoshiko’s bold words—Yoshiko, who no longer seemed like the girl he knew. That Yoshiko who once wore a flesh-colored undergarment and leapt about—that talkative Yoshiko—now wore just a single threadbare kimono and had tied an adult-like obi around it, and as her words suggested, Yoshiko had already become a woman. That vibrant vitality akin to spring grass must have been racing through her veins with a fierce sound. The constrained swell of her chest, the rounded curve of her hips sweeping downward—though they lacked the heart-constricting force of Yukiko’s, they held a faintly fragrant beauty of life.

八ノ四

Kurokichi closed his eyes. Even as this crude, unfamiliar Yoshiko pressed in on him, he found himself thinking—for some reason—that he had to forget her.

In Kurokichi’s chest, the coquettish “Yukiko’s” visage had been seared all too rawly—.

(Yukiko has gone off with Gikō.) (Yukiko doesn’t give a damn about you anymore—)

Though he thought this, Kurokichi still couldn’t relinquish his lingering attachment.

“Yocchan… After all, once I leave here, I think I’ll do acrobatics again…”

Kurokichi changed the subject and spoke. "Oh my, with that... disabled body of yours—" "But I... I can't forget that feeling of being airborne during the swing act." "I want to forget everything and leap—" "But... though telling you this might backfire—that aerial act hinges on perfect synchronization. If your timing doesn't match the Swing's rhythm exactly, it's dangerous." "Yeah..." "But... but losing a leg changes everything about that timing—swinging with one leg versus thrusting with both... They're completely different... You'd likely barely reach half your former height."

“N-no…” (That’s right… That’s exactly how it is…)

Kurokichi sank into disappointment and became lost in thought. (Can I really no longer perform those acrobatic feats—) (Can I not fly through the air—) “Yocchan, don’t you know any good tricks...? Anything—anything’s fine—I want to fling this body of mine as hard as I can—hey, hey—maybe I should just jump off a high mountain—”

Kurokichi was grinding his teeth. “You—you there—” The old doctor came around.

“You mustn’t get so worked up now—what’s gotten into you?” “Ah, Doctor, Doctor! Isn’t there some job where I can fly through the sky—something where I can leap as hard as I want, where not having legs doesn’t matter—” The old doctor, momentarily stunned by this sudden question, stared at Kurokichi—whose left eye alone gleamed from within the bandages—but, “Well then, how about airplanes? —Not that *you* could pilot one... Oh! Wait, I’ve got just the thing. Three stations from here by train, there’s a place called the Kashiwagi Aviation Research Institute—you must’ve heard their planes sometimes—they’re recruiting parachutists, I hear. How does that sound…?”

“Parachutist?…” “Don’t you know? Look—it’s jumping from an airplane with a parachute.”

“Ah! That—that’s perfect… But Doctor, aren’t they already full?” “Not at all—they’re nowhere near full. After all, it’s a life-risking job. They’re researching new parachutes there—apparently they have test subjects try them out. That’s why they’re recruiting, I hear. They say you get ten yen per jump.” “Ten yen! They’ll even give ten yen?” Kurokichi himself and Yoshiko, who was beside him, both involuntarily widened their eyes. They had rarely ever seen something like ten-yen notes, after all.

“Ten yen is a pittance. If the parachute doesn’t open, you’re done for…… Well then, let’s get to your treatment.” With that, he had the nurse assist him and began unwrapping the bandages. Yet Kurokichi—far from feeling the pain of his wounds—remained utterly absorbed in imagining the heroic sight of an airplane rending the azure sky, its silver wings flashing as it soared over billowing cloud ridges, and his own gallant figure making a nimble leap from that very aircraft.

“Parachutist”

“Parachutist” Kurokichi kept muttering that foreign word he had just heard—Parachutist—over and over, as if it were a phrase he had yearned for since before his birth. And once more, those daydreams in the sky would be granted. What phantom will I behold this time…? (Perhaps Yukiko-chan and I…)

His chest pounded wildly, excitement surging through him. The uncanny allure of phantoms! He was so thrilled and excited it made him dizzy, his face flushed. As for Yoshiko, she— (the now high-earning Kurokichi)

Imagining the now high-earning Kurokichi, she felt a pain in her nipples.

Nine

Less than a month later, an ugly, one-legged, eerie little man visited the reception desk of the Kashiwagi Aviation Research Institute. Needless to say, that was Karasukurokichi. The receptionist, upon hearing that this monster-like little man was applying to be a parachutist, had been rendered speechless with disbelief before he could even laugh.

“You— “Don’t be ridiculous—do you even know what a parachutist is? Heh heh heh… If someone like you could become one, I’d have done it myself a hundred years ago…” But Kurokichi endured their mockery; after a relentless back-and-forth, he had shed countless tears by the time he finally got them to refer him to the director…… Even the Director, after taking one look at Kurokichi, “So it’s you—the parachutist applicant—”

In fact, he stood dumbfounded.

“It’s me.” “Please.” “By all means—please!”

“It’s no good. Even ordinary people find it quite difficult—and you’re missing a leg.” “But parachutists don’t need legs—I used to be an acrobat, I’ve done all kinds of grueling stunts—jumping from a plane is nothing… Please.” “Please—I’m begging you. Without this parachutist job… I can’t go on living…” Kurokichi had to plead so desperately there—just as he had at the reception desk—that it seemed his mouth might run dry from the effort.

The sight of this grotesquely deformed cripple pleading with eyes brimming with tears was less poignant than downright ghastly. “I beg you. “Even if I die, it’ll be my fault.” “Whether I can do it or not—just let me try… Please…”

Even the Director, who had stubbornly refused to consent, finally relented,

“There’s no helping it with you.—Well, if you’re fine with dying, I’ll let you try once…” he spat out, his mouth forming a taut, displeased line.

Kurokichi’s joy in that moment……. It was so—he couldn’t find the words—utterly beyond expression. With that terrifying face of his brimming with a distorted smile, he swung his unwieldy crutches about as he clunked, clunked around the room, until at last he let out an eerie, groan-like cheer. Then, upon spotting Yoshiko—who had anxiously accompanied him—waiting outside the gate, he darted toward her like a grasshopper and clung to her like an infant, bursting into tears... It seemed impossible that such an unbroken stream of tears could keep flowing...

After about half a month had passed—once Kurokichi’s body had fully adjusted and his ground training was complete—he was finally to ride in an airplane for the first time.

The sensation of being aboard the plane for the first time—how utterly magnificent it was…….

The engine’s roar swept away all his loathsome memories as it thundered on; in the infinite azure heavens he gazed upon, nothing existed to care about his ugly visage. That alone was for him a supreme delight—and behold! Far below, a mountain lay thickly sedimented. A stream writhing like a silver serpent. The forest swayed spindly and staggered backward, while the sea—resembling a festering basin—occasionally cast glances with a jealous glint. Eventually, the Earth—now transformed into stingy, mottled debris—gradually receded into the distance——.

Kurokichi was utterly ecstatic. (This is far, far more incredible than I ever imagined!)

(I’m going to leap down spinning round and round through this scenery.) (In that tight-lipped world, there must surely be bold, loquacious "dreams"...) The moment this thought struck him, he was seized by an urge to leap down immediately. Without thinking, he gripped the door, leaned out of the aircraft, and peered countless times at the distant world below.

9-2 “So… how was it…” With the meager stipend he received from the institute, at least for that day, Kurokichi was not in want. Yoshiko had become a live-in waitress at the only café in this small town. And despite not earning enough at Café Kintori to warrant commuting, she would frequently steal past the owner’s watchful eye to visit Kurokichi, who idled away his days on the second floor of a hardware store.

“So… how was it?” “Yeah, it was awesome, Yocchan.” “Oh, really—” “But—how should I put it… Anyway, acrobatics are like snot compared to an airplane. Man, airplanes are just…” “My, that sounds fantastic… I’d love to try it too—” “No way. Women… can’t do that—” “Oh, that’s not true! How cruel—how cruel to say I can’t do something just because I’m a woman…”

Yoshiko sniffed coquettishly, her whole body undulating with seductive charm as she shook Kurokichi’s shoulders. “Cut it out…” Kurokichi protested verbally even while clutching Yoshiko’s rounded shoulders with his gnarled hands.

Kurokichi found himself perplexed. Born inherently ugly—having long known better than anyone else, even himself, that his body and visage were exceptionally unsightly—Kurokichi had now lost one leg and one eye in that swing accident, with a thick earthworm-like scar running diagonally from the upper right of his face downward, rendering him so repulsive that even he no longer wished to look in a mirror—no, rather, Kurokichi had always harbored a fierce loathing for mirrors that reflected this ugliness of his in unvarnished truth—yet why did both Yukiko and Yoshiko show such special "affection" toward one as uncomely as he? Was this what they called women’s "peculiar tastes"? Or was it the psychology of women—this preference for extremes over moderation—that drove such affection……?

“Yocchan”

Kurokichi rested his chin on Yoshiko’s soft shoulder, gazing in fascination at her translucent white neck, “Yocchan—why’d you fall for someone like me? A monster of a man— I bet the shop’s full of way better-looking guys than me...” “What’re you talking about? Hmph! I hate those pale pretty-boy types who come to the shop—acting all proper on the surface when they’re all thinking the same thing anyway. Everyone who goes there’s just a bunch of lechers. Disgusting or whatever... I can’t stand it—”

Yoshiko spat out the word “customers” in a surprisingly vehement tone, disparaging them. “Hmph—I’d take someone like you with your refreshingly simple heart over those wolf-like bastards any day…” This was the precocious romantic psychology of a sixteen-year-old girl. Yoshiko had accumulated twenty years’ worth of experience in love compared to others—back when she’d been with the circus troupe, she had seemed such a childlike girl—.

“Oh... So to get girls to like me, I should act like I don’t notice them on purpose, huh?” “Well, yes... But if you do it too often, I won’t stand for it, you know.”

Yoshiko glared like an adult. “No way—I’d never do something like that—” Kurokichi stared burning-eyed at her neck where disheveled hair clung, “No way—as if I’d ever do that…” Even as he spoke these words and moved his hands toward Yoshiko’s ample bosom, an unexpectedly lush swell of flesh rose beneath her military-style obi—so soft, so warm, so maddening—that his trembling fingertips were seized like suction cups before he could gasp.

Yoshiko turned around and smiled wordlessly—a complicated smile—her face no longer that of a girl. “Oh, no, no…” Even as she protested, she kept Kurokichi’s hand firmly pressed against her chest, making no move to release it. Then she closed her eyes.

Kurokichi, too, closed his eyes. The supple, squirming body in his arms merged with the Yukiko behind his eyelids until he felt as though he were clutching her with all his strength. (Yukiko-chan—) The moment he thought that, the woman in his arms was no longer Yoshiko. Passion roared through his veins like wildfire. (Yukiko-chan!) Crying out in his heart even as he cried aloud, he pressed his cheek against hers and pulled her into a crushing embrace…

That day, Kurokichi married Yukiko, and Yoshiko married Kurokichi. The two precocious individuals were mutually satisfied with this arrangement.

9-3

After those magnificent accompanied test flights concluded two or three times, Kurokichi was finally set to carry out his first descent as a parachutist—entrusting his life to a single rope of fate. After jumping down, he would count to five in his head, then yank the cord with all his might to deploy the parachute—and then all he had to do was settle into swaying gently as a cosmopolitan of the skies.

But what a thrill-filled moment that was! What if I pull the cord and the parachute doesn't open?! One in a thousand, one in ten thousand—no, absolutely—Kurokichi could not survive to stand upon this earth.

Moreover, these parachutes here were, so to speak, still under testing—who could possibly guarantee their absolute safety? Even the engineers who designed them could be confident, but when it came to that final point, they had to repeat these practical tests time and again.

If there was a single mistake with the rope, if there was an error in just one fold……. That Kurokichi’s body would be reduced to smithereens was clearer than watching flames—what a terrifying job this was. What a reckless test this was. A parachutist—that is a cosmopolitan of the skies.

...On that day, the institute staff on the ground watched with bated breath—staring intently at the silver aircraft roaring through the blue sky—to see what sort of "descent act" this disabled Kurokichi would perform. The airplane circled stiffly like a taxidermied black kite. To receive commands from the pilot, this antiquated training plane required its occupants to press earphones tightly against their ears.

“Hey!” A terribly loud voice buzzed against Kurokichi’s eardrums like a mosquito’s hum. Because the surroundings were so saturated with noise, it remained unclear whether the voice was loud or soft. “There’s a northeast wind of about ten meters… When you see the airfield to your right, jump… We should drift right over it… Almost there… Ready? Hey! Get set…” The pilot’s voice came through broken and fragmented.

Kurokichi quietly removed the earphone from his ear and took off the headband. And while running his hand around and stroking the parachute securely strapped to his back, he squeezed his eyes shut……. There was nothing in the depths of his eyes. He felt no fear…… And when he quietly opened his eyes again, the pilot ahead turned around, his aviator goggles glinting sharply as he waved his hand— To the eyes of the ground staff, the airplane glinted sharply. And from that aircraft, a single speck like a mote of dust detached itself and fell away.

(Kurokichi had jumped—) Meanwhile, Kurokichi—swimming through the air as he left the silver wings behind—plunged endlessly, endlessly into a pitch-black, unresponsive world. In air that violently ruptured, quaked, and surged, within Kurokichi’s head—freed from all color and sensation—an indescribable rainbow-like phenomenon exploded in a shower of sparks for an instant—and in the next moment, there appeared the face of an unfamiliar, lovely girl, staring fixedly at Kurokichi with a faint smile.

(Who?…) As he tried to get another look—tightening his muscles and twisting his body—the instant he did so, a tremendous noise like dynamite exploding erupted beneath his feet. At the same moment, Kurokichi felt an incredible force yank him upward dozens of meters, leaving him violently tossed about in midair.

The parachute had opened. The instant Kurokichi wrenched his body with force, he unconsciously pulled the cord to deploy the parachute. (If I’d stayed drunk on that dream and forgotten to open the parachute…) Of course, he would’ve been slammed headfirst into the ground. After being suspended midair by the sturdy rope, he recalled how he’d been intoxicated by that strange vision and felt a chilling shiver race down his spine.

When he peered timidly downward, the ground was already alarmingly close—the lone pine tree in the field writhed and swayed like waterweed in a marsh, stretching upward toward him.

9-4

When Kurokichi landed on the ground, the staff rushed over with worried expressions, but he silently accepted the crutches and began hobbling unsteadily across the vast, aimless airfield as if shaking them off.

His mind was occupied by that "girl from the vision." (Who... could that be?) Ah! He jerked to a halt. (That... that's Yukiko-chan—) Yes, that's Yukiko-chan... Definitely Yukiko-chan... That "Yukiko-chan" within the rainbow hadn't been clearly visible, but it seemed she'd been wearing her hair in a traditional bridal style—.

(Why...?) Like an endless airfield stretching before him, it was a vast question. (Was it because I'd been thinking too much about Yukiko-chan...?) Even so—why on earth had that vision shown Yukiko in a "bridal coiffure" she'd never once worn? (The dreams I have when flying are prophetic—then perhaps I'll meet Yukiko-chan soon, dressed in a bridal coiffure.) Kurokichi jerked his head up and glared at the azure sky. His eyes—perhaps it was his imagination—were shining like a beast's.

(Yukiko-chan... might have gone to Tokyo with Gikō...)

His neck drooped limply.

(There’s no way I could ever meet her——)

Kurokichi passed through the research institute’s back gate and began walking aimlessly along an uneven, faded, dusty road toward the edge of town. His head was feverish and flushed, his dragging leg hard as a board. As he grew more tired, this time he could no longer endure it and found himself with no recourse. He felt like he might burst into tears—like he might suddenly collapse right in the middle of the street……. To his parched throat and bloodshot eyes suddenly appeared—a tavern with a sign that read “Chidori Shokudo: A Quick Drink” and featured Baldy Choro.

He shoved the stained curtain aside with his shoulder and entered. Inside was a dimly lit, utterly bare shop with a dirt floor and nothing but three or four long benches.

There was no one there.

“Hey...”

When Kurokichi called out, immediately from behind the sooty chest of drawers in the living room—raised one step higher and adjoining the shop— “Yeah…” came a hoarse response.

A hoarse reply came. “Hey, this here’s a shop—” Following the old man’s voice,

“Oh, welcome…” A cheerful young woman’s voice—utterly incongruous with this dilapidated tavern—rang out, and there emerged like a blossoming flower a woman in bridal coiffure, her red lacquered geta clacking. “Welcome… What can I…”

“Ah—” “Oh—” “Yukiko-chan!” (Yukiko— (So that sky dream was real after all……)

Kurokichi was aghast.

And then, like an idiot, he stood there gaping, mouth hanging open—utterly unable to speak—. (Yukiko-chan—who was said to have gone to Tokyo with Gikō—why was she at a tavern like this… Why... why... WHY—) Ten “Yukiko-chan… It’s been a while, hasn’t it?” “Really…” “Um... I heard you went to Tokyo...” “That’s right—I did go to Tokyo once. But as it turned out, the uncle I went to see had come back to this town, so here I am again, you know…”

“Hmm, I see… Um… Well, what happened to Gikō—” “Gikō? Ah, that guy’s hopeless—he got too persistent so I ditched him in Tokyo… You’re well-informed, Kuro-chan.” (Kuro-chan!)

How many months had it been since he last heard those words from those cute red lips? It felt like he hadn’t heard them in decades…… Yukiko’s words… possessing a melting rhythm within a fiery tone unbefitting a girl. That vividly arranged bridal coiffure and her well-oiled hair had the power to stir men’s hearts to their very core. The mingled scent of her hair and a woman’s body odor—that alluring fragrance piercing the chest——.

“It’s my uncle’s hobby, you know—making me wear my hair like this—”

Saying this, she slightly bowed her head—the beauty of her smoothed nape…….

Kurokichi felt a dizzying sensation. “Yukiko-chan, Yukiko-chan… I missed you so much.” “But we’ve met.” “Yeah… It’s good… Really good—” Kurokichi was excited and overcome with emotion, as though he had finally laid hands on a gem he had sought for many long years. Yukiko, aside from being slightly startled at how this boy—already ugly before—had transformed into an even more monstrous figure with one eye and a lame leg, was not particularly moved by their reunion.

Put another way, Kurokichi alone was the one moved and excited.

But that these two had reunited in such a place was, by any consideration, entirely a coincidence. To Kurokichi, the fact that Yukiko’s sole uncle had been running a tavern here was divine intervention—no, the work of that “prophetic dream”—or so he believed. “Yukiko-chan—I found you. I found you before coming here.” “Oh, when—”

“Just now… you know, I must’ve told you before—that dream I see when flying through the sky. That’s it. When I jumped down with the parachute today… I suddenly saw your face, Yukiko-chan…” “Oh, is that so—” Yukiko made a slightly frightened face. “That’s creepy…” “It’s not creepy… I—I’ve always been thinking about you nonstop, Yukiko-chan…” “Well… I hate people who say things like that—why do men always act that way? Gikō kept saying stuff like that too, so I got sick of him and had to say goodbye.”

“Gikō…”

(Damn it! (That Gikō likes Yukiko-chan...) Kurokichi involuntarily gripped his crutches tightly.

“What’s wrong, Kuro-chan?” “Uh, no—it’s nothing.” “Oh…” “Hey, Yukiko-chan… why don’t you come over to my place…” “Oh… right…”

“That’s right! Thanks.” “My place is on the main gate street of the institute—go straight down that way, and on the left there’s a hardware store called Hirotaya. It’s on the second floor.” “Are you living alone…?” “Yeah, of course I am…” “Oh my, how impressive—managing all by yourself… Well then, I’ll come in.”

“It’s true… I swear… right…”

Part 10-2

Kurokichi returned home drunk like an adult, humming some incomprehensible tune with the first cheerfulness he’d shown since being discharged from the hospital. ——unaware that Yukiko was following behind, her eyes shining with curiosity——.

“My, what’s with you today…”

Just as he was finally about to painstakingly crawl up the last of the stairs to the second floor，a voice suddenly called down from above，startling him。 “Oh，it’s Yoshiko…” “My，you’re so energetic today…” “Yeah。” Kurokichi stuck out his one leg and， “Yocchan… today，I met Yukiko-chan…” “What?! With Yukiko-chan?!” “Yeah，Yukiko-chan—it’s Yukiko。The one who’s close with me—” “Oh，really… where…”

Yoshiko—whether it was her imagination or not—made a disgusted face and looked down. “Well, you know that tavern called Chidori near the back gate? That’s the place.” “Ah, that place. No wonder. “The customers coming to the shop have been saying it—‘Lately there’s this real looker over at that place!’ Thanks to that, everyone from the institute goes there now. “They must be going there to go after Yukiko-chan…” “Hmm.” Then Kurokichi made a disgusted face and fell silent.

“Hey, Kuro-chan… between Yukiko-chan and me—who do you like more—” “Yeah.” “Hey, hey… so…?” “I… I… Yukiko-chan too…”

“Yeah, I knew it’d be like that… someone like me…” “No, Yocchan, Yocchan—that’s not what I meant… You know… you know…”

Kurokichi, even as he himself struggled with his alcohol-tinged breath, firmly pulled Yoshiko’s trembling shoulders close and, “Yocchan, don’t get the wrong idea—I... I was just saying I met Yukiko-chan after so long... right? That’s all it was——” At that moment, as the stairs creaked loudly, Yukiko appeared at the worst possible moment.

“Oh—”

Yukiko, still gripping the stair rail at the top of the steps, took one look to assess the situation in this cramped room and—

“Kuro-chan, do enjoy yourself… Hohoho… How absurd to claim you’re alone…” “Yocchan… what a reunion… Do lavish attention on that crippled monstrosity, won’t you? I merely came to amuse myself with some light teasing—boredom drives one to odd whims—but it seems you’ve prior engagements… Take your sweet time… Farewell——”

“Ah, Yukiko-chan!”

With a jerk, Kurokichi pulled away from Yoshiko— (Shit—) he thought frantically while scrambling to explain, "Yukiko-chan, Yukiko-chan, don't misunderstand! It's nothing! Yocchan just came by to visit—we were... we were talking about maybe going to see you... that's all it was..." "That's enough—stop coming around! To summon me here just to parade yourselves together... Hmph. If you're such a catch, Kurokichi-san, then that woman... she's no better... Kuro-chan, don't you dare misunderstand—I loathe you..."

“If it’s advice you’re coming to me for, I hardly think it’s the sort of talk that requires embracing someone, now is it——”

Yukiko’s face—now faintly pale with a stern look emerging—was terrifyingly, exquisitely beautiful. Yukiko, who had carried the aura of a temptress since childhood, now spoke with gangster-mistress ferocity—her fiery tone piercing through Kurokichi’s chest with scorching bitterness.

All the more so—the fierce words from Yukiko, whom he had loved with his entire soul, devoting his whole being to her, unforgettable even in dreams—words that had cruelly rejected him—pierced through his skull like a poisoned needle. “Yukiko-chan, don’t…” Kurokichi looked up as if chasing after her, his single wide-open eye drenched in overflowing tears. “That’s enough—I don’t want to hear it—” Yukiko dashed down the stairs as if swept away by a gust.

“W-wait…”

With his disabled leg, Kurokichi desperately chased after her, bounding forward as if leaping—

(Ah—) The moment he thought this, he tumbled headlong down the stairs. Ugh… As his breath caught, in that instant—on his dulled retina—were etched the undulating hips of Yukiko walking briskly away without turning back... Strangely, they were hips clad in nothing—not even a kimono—utterly naked and tormentingly alluring.

10-3

“Kuro-chan—”

When he finally made it up to the second floor using Yoshiko’s shoulder for support, Yoshiko looked utterly exasperated, “Kuro-chan, what a disgraceful spectacle—how dare you humiliate me like this… Hmph! Just because Yukiko-chan came, you didn’t have to leap up in such a panic! If you hate me this much, why don’t you act like it? —It’s only because I thought you were pitiful and disabled that I came to help, but you just got carried away— Ugh, I’m not Yukiko, but I’ll have you know I’m done with you! Honestly…” “With that monster-like face of yours, calling me ‘Yocchan’ is just absurd.” “Stop it.” “I have no intention of letting you call me Yocchan anymore.”

“...I was such a fool. My half-hearted sympathy let that man take advantage of me... made him hate me... Hmm-hmm-hmm... how... how amusing... What a fool Yoshiko is——” Yoshiko, who had been snarling her rebukes through clenched teeth, finally grew nasal-voiced and left while stifling her rising sobs with her sleeve.

Kurokichi no longer had the energy to stop it. Without knowing why, he lacked even the strength to wipe the endlessly overflowing tears. Himself—having lost both Yukiko and Yoshiko in an instant—. It felt like after a violent downpour—strangely unbelievable yet still haunted by something ominous lingering—... Even now, sitting there, he felt this eerie sensation that Yukiko and Yoshiko might come laughing through the entrance any moment with a "Good afternoon——".

Yet, that moment was far too cruel. Yukiko, whom he had loved so intensely, and Yoshiko, who had cared for him so devotedly—through this slight mishap, they had now drifted far away from him. It was unfair to Yoshiko—and when he thought about it, a strange thing indeed—but the one he had truly loved, the one who had truly satisfied him, was not Yoshiko but Yukiko after all.

Kurokichi, while embracing Yoshiko, thought of Yukiko and caressed her as if she were Yukiko. In other words, Yoshiko’s body was, for Kurokichi, “Yukiko’s phantom.” It was merely a warm, realistic projection.

Kurokichi, while embracing Yoshiko with all his strength, was intoxicated by Yukiko’s scent. What an aberrant love this was—what violent yearning for Yukiko—! That first kiss on the tempestuous night of the circus troupe! That was when Kurokichi had been merely ten years old……. For Kurokichi, even were he to forget Yoshiko—that pitiable puppet—he could never forget Yukiko. (Yukiko-chan…) Amidst cascading tears, Kurokichi called that name again and again.

Eleven

From then on, Kurokichi—mocked by the institute staff and even scorned by Yukiko herself, whom he cherished most—still stole moments of free time to drag his disabled leg to that Chidori Diner, visiting it persistently. By the time the Far Eastern Circus Troupe disbanded, Kurokichi had already been utterly cast aside by the fickle Yukiko; now that his appearance had grown even more grotesque, attempting to regain her favor was an utterly impossible proposition.

(At least once—anyway—she did come to my house…) This was likely what Kurokichi thought in his heart—but for Yukiko, it had merely been a casual, half-unconscious approach typical of her fickle nature as a woman. Moreover, she felt as if those intimate scenes between him and Yoshiko—his former competitor from their Far Eastern Circus Troupe days—had been deliberately flaunted before her—

(Hmph…) If anything, her resentment only swelled—she owed this wretched, ugly boy not even a single smile. Yukiko was far too beautiful and fawned over to concern herself with such trifles. Moreover, she busied herself entertaining high-ranking staff with fat purses and wealthy heirs who’d sniffed out her whereabouts from gods knew where; by contrast, even if she found Kurokichi—who knew too much of her past—a nuisance, she had no cause to grant him so much as a gracious look.

The more coldly Yukiko treated him, the more Kurokichi’s affection swelled. Yukiko would deliberately sit on other men’s laps right in front of the persistently visiting Kurokichi to provoke him. But Kurokichi could only remain silent, twisting his face into a lonely grin. Though his heart ached with a pain like being clawed apart, on the surface Kurokichi—helplessly in love—could only grin weakly. Yukiko, provoked by Kurokichi’s lack of reaction, grew all the more desperate, forcing herself to plunge into the crowd of ecstatic men…… It carried an uncanny air—one that could not possibly persist much longer in this state.

×

However, once he entrusted himself to the plane and leapt down from the sky—in that instant’s phantom vision—Kurokichi could lavish endless caresses upon Yukiko.

(Yukiko-chan... I was so lonely when I heard you went to Tokyo.) (Yes, I'm sorry...) (It's okay. I'm so happy we can be together like this now.) (Yes... me too... I suppose I came here because I wanted to see Kuro-chan.) (Yeah, I'd be happy if that's the case...) (But... but this isn't fair to Yocchan.) (What're you talking about—someone like that—it's really nothing, honestly, I'm just coming to hang out.)

(Oh really? Well, if that's true then fine...) (It's true—) (Ah! Danger!) The moment Kurokichi reached toward Yukiko, a tremendous roar erupted as the parachute deployed—and that blissful phantom vanished without a trace, leaving Kurokichi drifting through empty space like a fallen leaf....

That was the pitiful reality. But Kurokichi believed in the revival of that 'dream'.

(Someday, it will happen——) And so……. Night after night, he would sit alone like some solitary beast in a corner of Chidori Diner, his eyes licking over every inch of Yukiko’s body, while by day, within dreams of the vast sky, he would hold her tight.

11-2

Around this time, Kurokichi would voluntarily undertake that terrifying aerial adventure two or even three times a day. And on days without flights, he would sit dejectedly lost in thought in a corner of the institute, clutching his crutches, looking completely deflated. It was the figure of a lonely man who anchored his pleasure solely to the eerie visions that came when he leapt from the sky. However, even to this sole remaining oasis called “dream,” a terrible catastrophe finally arrived.

It was an abominable vision—one that struck him like being suddenly plunged into a thousand-fathom abyss—of Yukiko and the son of a wealthy cosmetics merchant from a town not far away being soon to marry, coming just before any resolution of their misunderstandings or realization of harmonious conversation. From the moment Kurokichi saw this ominous vision, he completely lost his mental equilibrium. (My joyful dream—my magnificent paradise—will now be smashed to splinters...)

(Never once have those “daydreams of the sky” been wrong—if that’s the case, then this abominable “prophecy” must surely come to pass——)

How utterly terrifying this was. The idol “Yukiko”—whom he had loved, revered, and yearned for from the depths of his heart since first gaining self-awareness, as if she were a parasitic plant entwined around his entire life—was now abandoning this self of his to marry another.

Judging from Yukiko’s recent treatment—cold to the point of cruelty— (Could such a thing really come to pass……)

The very thing he had dreaded and feared was now on the verge of coming to pass. That Yukiko—the most beautiful flower to ever bloom in this world, the Yukiko he had loved and yearned for more than life itself—was now about to be tightly embraced by the lustful arms of some stranger. (Indeed—I am a cripple, and what's more, an ugly man...) But—this ugly man was born this way—hadn't Yukiko once made a firm, unbreakable promise with this very ugly Kurokichi? And wasn't it Yukiko who, in their youth, had already introduced him to womanhood——? This disability—if he were to say—stemmed from the agony of parting with Yukiko and fearing the circus troupe's disbandment, leading him to attempt peering into tomorrow and fail——.

It had been Yukiko who, despite Kurokichi being derided as a cowardly “bug,” had made him the Far Eastern Circus Troupe’s star performer. It had been Yukiko who had given Kurokichi—a boy who had never known his mother—his first taste of a woman’s tenderness. And both his first love and his first kiss… none of these could be separated from Yukiko in Kurokichi’s world. And now, he was on the verge of receiving his first tearful “heartbreak” from her……. Just thinking about it was terrifying enough to send a shudder through him and raise goosebumps.

Why must I think such things—that was terrifying. (I just hope it isn’t true——) (It’s enough as things are now. Even if she doesn’t offer a single kind word—even if those cold eyes are turned upon me—it’s still enough that I can be near her every day……)

Kurokichi could no longer stay still.

He hurried across the vast airfield, now growing dim, toward Chidori Diner.

11-3

The sunset was the color of rotten blood. An eerie silence, like an ominous portent, pressed down over the entire field, while the evening haze enveloped the surroundings with oppressive weight. And a dark, howling wind that scythed through the weeds... Ahead, the lights of Chidori Diner came rippling hazily into view—and at the same moment, the figure of a young woman emerged faintly like a shadow puppet. Oh—could that be Yukiko? The woman with that distinctive, alluring sway of her hips was indeed Yukiko.

(Damn—so she’s going to meet that cosmetics dealer’s lover……) Kurokichi’s head flared up with fiery heat. And with a speed unimaginable for a man with one leg, he dashed across the field. “Yukiko-chan—” Finally catching up, Kurokichi cried out in a shrill, hoarse voice, as if lunging to block her path. “Huh—” As Yukiko spun around, a dark shadow of instinctive fear flickered across her face for an instant. “Yukiko-chan—even though we see each other every day, how many months has it been since I’ve called you Yukiko-chan like this, just the two of us?”

“...” “You don’t have to make such a disgusted face… Do you really hate me that much—” “...” “I—I’ve been risking my life thinking of you… Hey… hey… couldn’t you at least try to understand? Huh?” “...” “Can’t you at least give me some kind of reply… Are you going to meet that pasty-faced cosmetics dealer’s son again……” “Well now—why would you—”

“Heh heh heh... Surprised?—I know everything.” “That’s not true—I just came here on some business—” Yukiko, perhaps momentarily moved by Kurokichi’s fervor, began speaking earnestly—but when stray moonlight fell upon his cursed, grotesquely disfigured face, she shuddered and spat: “Kuro-chan, let’s say goodbye properly—it’s better for us both, don’t you think? Ohohoho... Come now—let’s bury the past with the Far Eastern’s disbandment and become strangers... You should feel grateful I ever pitied you at all... As I said—I’m going to meet him now... Staying overnight—must be so enviable...”

Even in the weak moonlight filtering through the haze, her face bore a sharp severity that, to Kurokichi, was despair itself. “Yukiko-chan—just once more, let me hold your hand, let me embrace your rounded chest…… That’s all I ask—I’ll be satisfied with that…… Please…… Just once more——” “What are you even saying, you lame fool?… Your face looks just like a monster’s—how dare you spout such shameless nonsense with that face… You’d do better to go grope Yoshiko or something……”

The autumn airfield was enveloped in a desolate darkness. The surroundings were dimly dark; Kurokichi’s eyes, blazing with rage, glinted with murderous intent, while from his misshapen body came a ghastly bloody breath that heaved violently. “Ugh... Damn it.”

As he groaned, his left hand was already digging into Yukiko’s throat, now white and constricted.

“Wh-what are you doing—?”

Yukiko brushed away his hand, mocked Kurokichi’s one leg, and twisted away to flee—when suddenly, Kurokichi swung his crutch overhead in a frenzy and brought it down on her with all his strength. A single piercing scream tore through the air as Yukiko collapsed. Kurokichi had become the devil’s thrall.

He gripped his crutches and flung them away as if tearing them from his hands. “Damn it… Damn it…” Screaming madly, he suddenly threw himself onto Yukiko’s collapsed body like a beast and began throttling her throat with all his strength. ——And then, what atrocities unfolded in this utterly deserted field… Only her stark-white soles could be seen, vulgarly splayed like starfish on the seabed within the pale moonlight dissolving into haze, while kimonos and undergarments lay scattered like storm-battered flowers across the ground, and the metallic reek of a young woman’s blood hung thick in the air.

11-4

The next day—.

The Mid-Autumn sky stretched high above, a serene and radiant day.

As usual, the airplane pulled from its hangar to the runway took Kurokichi aboard and—utterly unaware that a brutal murder had been committed on this field last night—plunged effortlessly into a cloudless blue sky. Suddenly noticing, Kurokichi found the empty space beneath his seat crammed full with something resembling a large cloth-wrapped bundle, awkwardly wedged in. ……No one had noticed when such a thing had been loaded aboard…….

But that—it seemed to be Yukiko’s corpse—there was such an ominous premonition.

×

The "Yukiko" he had loved so profoundly, had yearned for so desperately. That Yukiko would scorn and mock him so mercilessly was something even Kurokichi himself had never envisioned. Overcome by it all, Kurokichi—in a sudden vertiginous surge, half in a trance—thrust Yukiko into “death,” then pressed searing kiss upon searing kiss against her beautiful, chilling corpse. And then, for the first time, Kurokichi returned to himself—.

Kurokichi—who first awakened to consciousness amidst the garish hues of that unhinged circus troupe’s backstage, its coquettish shrieks, bawdy songs, and sweat-soaked flesh-colored undergarments; who had come to know and fallen in love with Yukiko, that beautifully warped girl, all too soon— Kurokichi—who, through those acrobatics where he channeled every ounce of strength into vaulting across the void’s brink, discovered a peculiar self-hypnosis— And then Kurokichi—now maimed, grown ever more obsessive, pursuing only “delightful dreams with Yukiko” until even the boundary between dream and reality had long since dissolved—

For Kurokichi, this "murder" had been an inevitable culmination—a destination reached as if by natural course. Yet Kurokichi—now Yukiko’s killer—found himself intoxicated by inexpressible bliss. (Yukiko—the Yukiko I’d yearned for so desperately—was finally mine to command—) Yukiko no longer made a single disagreeable face. However close he pressed his ugly visage, she didn’t laugh. However fiercely he embraced her……even as her fragrant petal-like countenance grew slick beneath kisses falling like rain, piercing like bullets…….

(What bliss this was—) But Kurokichi could no longer afford to remain intoxicated by that happiness. Was it his imagination? With a start, he looked up to find the long autumn night had already passed, and the sky was beginning to pale with the first light of dawn.

(If someone sees...) He knew perfectly well that if someone were to see them, it would all be over. After being torn from this Yukiko, I would be sentenced to death and thrown into some incomprehensible grave pit.

The death penalty itself didn’t frighten him. He simply couldn’t bear being torn apart from Yukiko, whom he had finally obtained.

Kurokichi, after much agonizing thought, hit upon the idea of taking Yukiko into the sky. Once this idea struck him, he dragged Yukiko’s corpse all the way to the hangar over a long while, brought it inside through a familiar entrance he knew well, forcibly crammed it into the unusually wide fuselage—which opened sideways below the seat of the only old-fashioned training plane—then feigned ignorance as he waited for the flight…….

×

The airplane took off. Fortunately, no one had noticed—. Kurokichi and Yukiko’s aerial honeymoon had begun. The altimeter’s dial installed nearby spun rapidly upward. The distant Earth reeled and writhed beneath his feet…

Kurokichi presently began untying the cloth bundle at his feet as though suddenly remembering it. When the wrapping was yanked away like a shed skin, what lay exposed was the utterly naked form of that beautiful young enchantress Yukiko—not a stitch of clothing remaining on her body. And though her soul had long departed, that pale, perfectly proportioned form—responding to the airplane’s mechanical tremors—undulated obscenely as if alive, obediently kneeling at Kurokichi’s knees.

“Yukiko-chan—my Yukiko, mine alone…” The voice he had bellowed with all his strength scattered vainly into empty space. But Kurokichi was happy. Inside his flight helmet, he flicked his thick tongue over his lips, slackened his ugly face into a grin of apparent delight, and gazed without respite at Yukiko’s lascivious form.

十一ノ五

In an infinitely clear blue sky—a blue so intense it seemed to melt one’s eyeballs—Kurokichi flew while clutching Yukiko tightly.

“Hey! Get ready…”

Suddenly, through the speaking tube, the pilot’s gruff voice came through. Startled, Kurokichi rose from his seat and peered down at the distant world below. A scene like a miniature garden spread its arms as if eagerly awaiting Yukiko’s corpse, swaying languidly in a macabre dance.

Had Kurokichi gone mad? Suddenly removing his parachute, he tore off his flight helmet, ripped away his flight suit, and with brutish roughness lifted Yukiko’s corpse—at that very moment, (Ah—)

The moment he thought this, the tightly embracing, completely naked man and woman plummeted from the silver aircraft toward the distant, distant Earth far below—with bomb-like ferocity, on and on and on they fell…….

×

Kurokichi was satisfied.

The mountains, rivers, forests, and fields he had grown accustomed to seeing every day until now seemed to gently embrace just the two of them—this self and her—in their final descent. And what divine blessing this was—as he plummeted through layers of shattered air, was he not clutching Yukiko with all his strength in his arms, determined not to let even hell part them——.

Had not Kurokichi's mysterious daytime visions—those he experienced while flying through the sky—now manifested more vividly than reality itself……. (Kuro-chan, forgive me. After all, I... I'm completely yours now.) (You finally understood me… Yukiko-chan. You finally understood my feelings…) (I understand, I understand—I'll never leave your side again.) (Thank you... Yukiko-chan. Thank you. I'll never... I'll never let go again……)

Ah. Yukiko stared at him, her black eyes even flashing with coquetry. Yukiko’s lips—crimson as blood blossoms—quivered as they drew nearer…….

(Ah, I’m happy……)

(*Detective Literature* Showa 10 (1935) June–October issues, unfinished. Completed upon inclusion in *Yumeki* (1936 [Showa 11]).)