Pathway to Japanese Literature

I What reasons lay behind the Russo-Japanese War—through what oppression and humiliation from Russia toward Japan—and how the Japanese government had roused its people to abandon tens of thousands of their countrymen’s corpses across Manchuria’s plains were beyond my understanding at seven years old. Yet, “It’s the Ruskies who are evil! The Red Beards are to blame!” This idea—stirred into the villagers, especially the young men, by the Village Headman and leaders of the veterans’ association until it became common parlance—reached even us children,

“Ruskies’ Red Beards and Kuropatkin!” we would go around shouting with slurred tongues. Even in children’s fights, “What’re you, some Ruskie…” just saying this became enough to thoroughly insult someone—it had turned into one of those potent slurs.

It was one day. Despite the fine weather, my father had spent two or three days wandering about with a troubled expression, not going to work but visiting relatives around the neighborhood (he was a day laborer—my father had no skilled profession to speak of), when two or three people—uncles and Grandfather—began drinking in the narrow entrance area of our house. Mother, still in her dirty clothes, was serving drinks while sniffling.

For me, such a scene was a first. Father, who ordinarily never drank alcohol, let alone Mother serving drinks—it was something I had never seen before. I sat blankly at the wooden door entrance, perched on the edge as I watched this scene, when for some reason Grandfather grabbed my hand with his wrinkled one and pulled me toward where Father sat in the entryway. So my younger sister, who had been playing with me, followed after me while sniffling.

Then Father—wearing a strangely different face from his usual one—stroked my head and tried to say something, but I couldn’t make it out.

“Father’s going off to war, see, so you be good and play nice now—that alright with you?…” Grandfather said this from beside me and made me nod. “Father was going to go subjugate the Russians,” I concluded. I felt not a shred of sadness at parting with Father. But Father had neither a sword nor a gun, so it somehow felt unsatisfying.

Two or three days later, Father was no longer at home; he had most likely gone off to war while we were asleep—either early in the morning or in the dead of night.

“Mother, which direction is the war in?” My sister, two years my senior, and I would sometimes ask this after lying down at night with Mother between us. After Father disappeared, Mother, fearing she would use too much lamp oil, would immediately lock up and lay out the bedding once her night work was done. The youngest brother was held by Mother, next came my younger sister, beside her my older sister, and right behind Mother was I. “The war’s way over there, in a place called Manchuria!”

However, whether Manchuria lay to the west or east of our house, Mother didn't seem to know either. My sister pointed and asked, "That way? This way?"

But even so, Mother would give inconsistent answers.

Mother was a resolute woman. With four children to care for, she kept smoke rising each day, thin though it was.

“How are we supposed to live on a one-gō-per-person ration?!” Every time Mother saw the meager rice bags delivered two or three times a month from the ward chief’s office as bereavement support for soldiers’ families, she would rage as if deceived and hurl the bags away. Each day, Mother carried a large bamboo basket on a shoulder pole to the 23rd Regiment’s barracks to fetch leftover food. She bid on and bought by the load the soldiers’ uneaten rice, pot-scorched grains, and leftover broth. Then she called over the neighboring poor housewives to parcel it out or sell it.

After Father went off to war, we never ate freshly cooked rice again. Still, even with leftover rice that had been steamed two or three times over, we managed to get by without going hungry. The following year, at age seven, I entered elementary school. At school, even during playtime, we were taught military songs without exception. A mere one sen per month and

... 12,800 tons

None in the world could rival it, they said, It was christened America Boy. I don't remember clearly, but those were the words. The song's melody I still recall. From first grade onward, we were charged one sen monthly for naval warship construction fees.

This song was indeed a celebratory anthem for Japan's first large warship built during the Russo-Japanese War. A female teacher named Tsuda, her belly swollen near term thrust forward, raised her legs high and waved her hands as she taught us this game and song. We formed a circle around her, singing and dancing while being drilled that war was the noblest endeavor and those born human yet refusing to fight ranked below the disabled.

In my childish heart, I took immense pride in my father going to war, and among my playmates, I walked with my head held high.

One morning, in the schoolyard after performing the deepest bow to the imperial portrait, the principal had students whose fathers were soldiers deployed to the war come up to the podium and express their impressions. Of course, as elementary school students, there was no way they could have expressed such impressions before everyone, but each homeroom teacher had made them memorize the phrases they were supposed to say the day before. As a first grader, I was the second to be called by the principal and went up to the podium.

Although I was trembling with fear, I spoke as loudly as I could according to what I had been made to memorize the previous day. "My father is Tokunaga Isokichi of the Sixth Army Logistics Transport Battalion, a logistics transport soldier in the logistics corps—"

When I said this, the older students—the bigger children—began to snicker. I didn’t quite understand why, but I was so ashamed that I fell silent. Then the principal glared fiercely at everyone, “You must not laugh.” he said.

“He went to the Russo-Japanese War. I will study hard, and when I grow up, I will become a soldier like Father, go to war, and strive to serve His Majesty the Emperor and the country.” With that, he returned to his seat.

After returning home, I proudly told Mother all about it. Then my third-grade sister came home and said resentfully.

“Because Nao said ‘logistics transport soldier,’ everyone laughed at me.”

With that, she finally burst into tears. I realized then that the upperclassmen had laughed because my father's position as a logistics transport soldier was considered the very lowest rank among soldiers - that must be why they had laughed, I thought.

Mother remained silent. I remembered that my friend Kii-kun’s father was a trumpeter soldier, and I thought how grand Kii-kun’s father seemed. The war showed no signs of ending. From our village, people kept leaving for the front one after another. Not long after I started elementary school, an uncle who lived nearby went off to war.

In my household without a man, I went as the representative along with everyone to see Uncle off at the station. My uncle was on active duty; not many years had passed since his return, and as a superior private in the Thirteenth Regiment, he carried himself with great authority. In my uncle’s household, there were still no children. My aunt, far younger than my mother, stood there as everyone shouted “Naohiko, banzai!” three times and tried to leave the house’s alleyway with Uncle—dressed in his veteran’s uniform—at the center. But at the doorstep, she burst into loud tears.

The next morning, Uncle passed through the station at the edge of our village alongside many others bound for the same war. Aunt, Grandfather, and my mother too had all entered the station premises and been waiting there since early on. When the train arrived, so many people were leaning out of the windows that it was hard to tell which one was Uncle. The aunt who had spotted him first clung to the window and conversed with Uncle. Soldiers leaning out the windows—wearing caps with yellow stripes (at that time they didn’t yet have red stripes)—kept looking around to see if anyone had come to visit them. The scene was far too chaotic, and I stood there in a daze.

Before long, the whistle sounded and the train began to move. Aunt still did not let go. “Watch out!” shouted the conductor as he came running and pulled her back from behind. Aunt was crying. Mother and Grandfather, separately from that, were frantically waving their hand towels toward the waving hat of Uncle, who was growing distant.

About ten days later，Aunt came to live with us． In addition to my cousin Saduske，three others from my relatives were called to war． From the battlefield（I had recently learned the word “battlefield”），military mail occasionally arrived． Older Sister always read them． They were all written in hiragana and katakana．

Mother went to carry “leftover food” every day. Aunt, small in stature, laid out a straw mat under the eaves of the house and did side work shaving bamboo chopsticks. Both my older sister and I were made to help as soon as school let out. I hated this “chopstick-shaving” the most. Since we had to meticulously shave the bamboo pieces that were split small with a kogatana (knife), it was so tedious, so unbearably tedious. I always carried “sketches” in my pocket, and wanting to work on them, I would seize any chance to slip away.

Our play-acting was most lively with war games, and we would beat each other quite mercilessly. On moonlit nights, many children would gather to talk and compete to capture "positions" centered around the village shrine at the edge of town. I was strong but not agile, so I often came home with lumps on my head. Also, "sketches" depicting scenes of war and portraits of generals and lieutenant generals became extremely popular. It was around that time that I also memorized the portraits and names of General Kuroki, Ōyama, Nozu, Nogi, Vice Admiral Uriu, and others.

Extra editions would occasionally arrive clamorously ringing their bells. Whenever they heard the bell, Aunt and Mother, despite being unable to read, would turn pale, panic, and rush out to buy them. I often chased barefoot after the extra edition sellers.

“Won, won Jiuliancheng!” I think it was long before Mukden, but when Jiuliancheng fell, all the villagers went wild with joy. Whenever we won at “position capture,” we would invariably bellow “Won, won Jiuliancheng!” and clap our hands and dance.

Atop the great camphor tree of the village shrine hung a large national flag. It was Jin-san the Tree Climber who had scaled those perilous heights with death-defying resolve to secure that great banner. They said this act carried their prayer: “May victory bless our war! May our village’s soldiers return safe from battle!” Yet death notices kept arriving like relentless waves. “Sada fell at the front!” Grandfather cried.

One evening, Grandfather entered through my house’s eaves, gripping a red-striped telegram as he stumbled in sobbing uncontrollably. Mother and Aunt—who hadn’t flinched much even when hearing of deaths among distant relatives—now seemed as if fissures had split open beneath their feet, forever on edge since Saduske had died in battle. Even with Saduske dead, there was no funeral. Without even a lock of hair sent back, there could be no burial. Grandfather’s house—where a son had died young and a grandson who was their last hope had perished at war—stood desolate.

I felt an overwhelming hatred for the Russians. News came of the death in battle of the landlord's eldest son, Mr. Yaichi. From my father, military mail still arrived occasionally, but from Uncle, it had stopped coming completely. Mother and Aunt would chant the Nichiren invocation every night, praying for Uncle and the others' safety.

After I got into bed, Mother and Aunt would act like madwomen— “Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō, Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō”— shouting at the top of their lungs and beating uchiwa-daiko drums as they chanted; I would hear them faintly through my half-sleep as they kept up their fervent prayers late into the night. I had grown somehow afraid of the war. I had somehow begun to want to see Father.

Mukden fell.

I don’t remember the exact month or day, but when I chased after the extra edition seller to buy it, it was during a hot summer—the scorching sun made the road’s sand burn against our bare feet (we children mostly went unshod), right at midday.

The school, for celebration purposes, had the principal merely speak about the fall of Mukden and the Japanese army’s great victory, and that day was a holiday.

In the village, ritual sake was offered at the shrine. Aunt rejoiced as if Uncle might return from the battlefield as soon as tomorrow.

Russian prisoners were brought. It was said that the Thirteenth Regiment had captured red-bearded Ruskies and would be putting them in temporary huts at the drill ground, so we went with the villagers to see.

The Russians were all tall. Just as I had imagined, their beards were red, their eyes glass-like, and they had a slow-witted air about them. They all wore black basket-like hats. And the prisoners looked at us children’s faces as they passed by, chattering away with grins. "The Russkies are laughin'!" We thought the Russians were utterly spineless. They’d had their guns and swords taken away, yet there they were grinning. I somehow found it strange.

We would make a detour on our way home from school nearly every day to go see the prisoners of war. “Spineless Red Beards—” “Where’s your sword?” We spent about an hour outside the bamboo fence, hurling insults and throwing stones at the Russkies packed inside like sardines. But the Russkies never got angry. Tousling their long red hair, they chattered away about something and smiled at us. In front of the hut’s fence, the Japanese sentries pacing back and forth with rifles shouldered only reached chest height against them.

The hulking Russkies obeyed the shrill, combative orders of their diminutive Japanese guards with nothing but compliance—grinning all the while—as they were herded from behind to stride leisurely toward places like the latrine with broad steps. I ate the leftover food those Russkies ate. It was millet rice drenched in seed oil. “Those Russkies sure eat greasy slop, I tell ya!” Mother said while straightening the bamboo basket and stuffing clumps of millet rice into her cheeks. When I heard it was what the Russkies ate, I stopped at once. And I wondered if we’d been reduced to eating even their scraps. Though I never told Mother, being poor made me feel so wretched and ashamed that from that day on, I stopped going to see the Russkies.

II I came to feel ashamed that my own parents were poor. Unlike a child of seven or eight, I became reserved in all things and grew prone to self-consciousness.

Moreover, my relatives' family was among the lowest class of poor people in the village. When the children of the village farmers saw my face, "Leftover-eater! Leftover-eater!" they jeered.

I came to be hit even by Shiroji, the landlord's youngest son, who was far more of a coward than I.

Even when I was hit, I didn’t cry. Even if I cried and returned home, I didn’t cry where Mother was. If I cried where Mother was, it was because I would have to be hit by her again.

There was once a time when I came home crying. Then Mother grabbed my hand and took me to the house of Gen-san, the bully leader who had hit me, to confront Genko’s mother: “Even if it’s a poor person’s child, how can you see something beaten until blood oozes and pretend not to know?!” Mother said this, her face flushed crimson, but Gen-san’s mother—the tenant rice harvester—merely brushed her off with a flick of her nose and did not engage. My mother trembled with bitter frustration and, in a fit of spiteful recklessness, began slapping me senselessly right then and there. I whimpered in pain and cried. However, Genko’s mother did not even try to stop her.

I began to play alone more often. And I always thought, “When Father comes home, we’ll surely become rich.” I went to pick strawberries, collect snails (snails are sweet when roasted and eaten), gather bamboo grass seeds, and such—sometimes with my sisters, but otherwise alone. Father never once came home. People had begun returning from the war here and there, but neither my uncle nor my father had come back yet. Around this time, I came to have a lover.

Having separated myself from the group of boys, I began to play with girls alongside my older sister.

That girl was named Emi. Across the road from my house, atop a high stone wall, stood a large tiled-roof house with a storehouse—a wealthy old-established family in the village—and Emi was the youngest daughter and only girl. She was a spoiled child, yet she had a mature and spirited aspect to her. I remember her being one year older than me, eight years old. At around seven years old, I surely couldn’t have had anything like sexual desire, but I was distinctly aware of romantic feelings. Emi, of course, seemed to feel the same way. The two of us, before we knew it, started to play in hiding, away from both the groups of boys and the groups of girls.

Once, we were discovered by the group of boys. The two of us were playing in the bran shed at Emi’s house. The group of boys who had discovered us had, before we knew it, completely surrounded the shed. “Waaah! Waaah! Waaaah!” And the rowdy boys clamored boisterously.

I was bewildered and shrank back. Then Emi, suddenly throwing down the doll she had been holding, went out to the door. And though she shouted something back, she soon called for Kuma, who had been lying in the inner garden, and set him on them. Kuma, the large shaggy dog, was an aged female, but at her master’s command, she barked sharply and fiercely, so even the rowdy bunch could not hold their ground and fled in an instant. The two of us had been on good terms for about a year, but as we gradually began to discern the distinction between rich and poor in various matters, we naturally grew distant.

And what’s more, I was the first to grow somehow timid. Emi was mature in all sorts of external matters but did not know that I was a “leftover-eater” or that logistics transport soldiers were the very lowest rank of all. Moreover, the reason I disliked playing on the second floor of Emi’s house was also something she couldn’t understand. From there, looking down, I could see directly below the thatched roof of my family’s four-unit row house—leaning and patched with straw mats where the rain leaked through.

III

Father returned from war. Almost simultaneously, Uncle also returned. Our neighborhood—the tenement next door—bustled with celebration for his return from war. For over three days, my house clamored with water drums and old shamisen clanging noisily.

The father I saw for the first time in two years was much darker in complexion and gaunter than before. Moreover, for some reason, he behaved toward us children with great kindness, in a manner as if he were a guest visiting strangers. Father was wearing a black crested haori, albeit an old one. And sitting in the midst of the guests, he did nothing but guffaw toward the village visitors who were fussing over him. The guests were important people who had come. First was the village headman—though his visit lasted barely an hour—who said, “You’ve endured much...” “After all, it’s a triumphant return—a joyous occasion!” “This too is due to His Majesty’s august influence!” he declared to my father, who was overwhelmed with humility, before taking his leave. Villagers who had never before paid us any mind now came offering exaggerated flattery to congratulate him. Emi’s grandfather also came. I was somehow so happy I couldn’t contain myself.

For about half a year after the war ended, there were various celebrations honoring those who had returned from battle. I would often be taken by Father to receive bottled sake and boxed meals that we brought home. When there was a celebration at the sacred garden of Lord Kato Kiyomasa enshrined in Honmyo-ji Temple for those returning from war, I went with Father, who wore the White Copper Leaf Medal and Military Service Badge on his chest. Women with flushed faces from drinking sake came tumbling into the banquet hall dressed as soldiers, dragging long swords that clattered noisily while shouting “Long live! Long live!”—and even the dignified officers with their meticulously groomed long beards abandoned decorum to cling to them.

To my father, who had received the Eighth Class Order of Merit and Eighth Grade of Military Merit, a lump sum of 150 yen was granted by the authorities. Father, who had scarcely been able to take on day labor since his return from war, decided to use that money as capital to start a horse-cart hauling business. Father, who knew no trade, had this business started through the horse-cart driving he had learned in the war.

A chestnut-colored, one-eyed old mare was hauled in late one night by my grandfather—who had been a horse trader in his youth—and my father, working together. And behind the row house, a small makeshift shed was built, and the horse was put there.

Within less than a year after the war ended, a magnificent depression arrived. Though he had started a horse-cart business, Father spent most days idling.

“You’d be better off quitting this horse-cart business.” “Lazing about all day with that horse—we’ll eat through everything at this rate…” Mother would say this each time before turning her reproaches on Father, whose mind had grown even foggier since his homecoming than it had been before. “Nao, go see if there’s no cargo moving today.” Whenever this happened, Father—that tight-lipped man—would summon me and send me to ask after cargo at Masukiya, our regular client.

Masukiya, located at the edge of the village bordering the town, had dozens of white-walled rice storehouses lined up. During prosperous times, rice was carried out from the storehouses here until the warehouses were stripped bare. Hundreds of horse carts lined up, clamoring loudly as they shuttled ceaselessly between Kamikumamoto Station and Kumamoto Station, their designated destinations. The warehouses of Masukiya—a joint-stock company that held a stranglehold over Higo rice distribution, particularly from the Yamaga, Kikuchi, Ōtsu, and Aso rice-producing regions—housed branch offices of the Rice Inspection Office, Higo Bank, and Hokutaku Bank.

I had been there often, so I knew the layout. On my way home from school, whenever I passed in front of these warehouses, I had developed the habit of always checking—almost unconsciously—whether any cargo was moving or if Father was present.

And lately, days when cargo moved had become rare. Moreover, the amount supplied from farmers had not changed in the slightest. In five- and ten-bale increments, the amount of rice that farmers—mixed with coarse grains—put up for sale was, exactly because they anticipated a bumper harvest before gathering it, always stalled in countless carts at the warehouse entrance. The rice that couldn’t be stored in the warehouses was piled up all the way to the storefront.

And not a single grain of rice from the warehouses was transported anywhere. My father, not being a regular employee, had no work for ten or even twenty days at a time.

Mother, who went to carry "leftover food," did nothing but fight with Father day after day. My expectation that “When Father returns, we’ll surely become rich and no longer be called leftover eaters…” came to nothing. When I was in second grade, my older sister was in fourth grade. Being more of a girl than I was, my sister—who worried endlessly about our household’s circumstances—took it upon herself to consult Mother, leave school, and become a factory girl at the Tobacco Monopoly Bureau.

At not yet thirteen years old, falsifying her age as fifteen, my older sister began rising at five in the morning to eagerly commute to the Monopoly Bureau a ri away, all to receive a daily wage of sixteen sen. My sister was mature for her age, but her height was about as small as mine. With a dirty lunch bundle tucked under her arm, my older sister bustled home in the evening. For the sake of being able to receive a wage of sixteen sen, she was truly bustling and rejoicing.

“With compulsory education now extended to six years, you must send them to school without fail,” the village headman and principal pressed, but Mother paid them no heed. Sister did not even glance their way.

IV

The following year, I advanced to third grade ranked third in my class. Even among elementary school students, whispers circulated that teachers deliberately manipulated grade rankings—raising some and lowering others—based on bribes from parents and guardians. But such matters concerned me not at all. Though classmates flattered me by claiming class leader Ueno was academically inferior to me, these words meant nothing to me. After all, since I wouldn’t be continuing to middle school and would need to quickly find factory work after fourth grade to earn wages, such things held no interest whatsoever.

That year, Mother gave birth to a baby. We became five siblings. To take care of the newborn baby boy, the days I missed school became more frequent than before. There were times when I would be absent for about a week straight.

Even so, I did not dislike school. I liked to read all sorts of books while standing near the back gate, my youngest brother strapped to my back with a cloth sling. Whether they were national language textbooks, rented storytelling books, or old women’s magazines, I voraciously read whatever I could scavenge. Moreover, I was good at reading aloud. As for storytelling tales—whether it was Iwami Jūtarō’s Great Serpent Slaying, Hakkenden, or Kanei’s Three Equestrian Arts—whenever the neighbors came to listen, I would read them with various inflections and brimming with pride.

When night fell, I would invariably be made to read three or four tales. When the second load of leftovers arrived, it became customary for the neighbors—Ohkichi the brush seller, Juudon the ash collector, one-armed Mr. Kuma, and others—to gather. Some would first take their rice home before returning, while others sat lined up on the entrance step, scooping rice and soup into their chipped bowls kept stored there. As they ate, they would listen enraptured to the dramatic stories I read aloud.

By the time I became a fourth grader, I was known throughout the school as an authority on dramatic tales. I remember there was once such an incident. Chikamatsu—the top student in our class—had drawn a picture of Kato Kiyomasa and Kiyama Danjo locked in combat as they fell from a cliff, which he proudly showed to everyone. However, Yonemura, the fifth-grade class leader, insisted it wasn’t Kiyama Danjo but Shitennō Tajima-no-kami in the drawing. Unable to settle whether it was Kiyama or Shitennō, Chikamatsu’s class of about thirty students clashed with Yonemura’s group of twenty-five or six, each side stubbornly arguing their case until they nearly erupted into a full-blown brawl. A quick-thinking classmate came to fetch me at home—since I’d been absent that day—to resolve the dispute. With my brother still strapped to my back, I went to where everyone had gathered and explained, “It was Kiyama Danjo.” I told them how Kiyama had actually been stronger than Kiyomasa—that while Kiyomasa had initially pinned him down during their fall, his helmet caught on a vine, allowing Kiyama to gain the upper hand and deliver the final blow. In the end, my class was declared victorious, and everyone cheered as they crowded around me. But on my way home alone afterward, members of the Yonemura faction ambushed me and beat me mercilessly.

V

At my house were the one-armed Mr. Kuma; Toyo with his red loincloth; Ohkichi the brush seller; Juudon the ash buyer; and others.

They were unforgettable people in my lifetime. The more I grew and became able to judge things clearly, the more I found myself unable to stop remembering these people. Mr. Kuma, who had one arm, was lame. Every night when evening came, he would spread out empty straw sacks in the dirt-floored area of my house and sleep there with my dog Hachi. He had no futon or bedding of any kind—only a red half-blanket that he would pull completely over his head before embracing Hachi and going to sleep, a routine he maintained.

And when noon came, he would walk around to various houses—taking care of small errands, helping with shopping for the sick—to scrape together money for buying "leftover food." When his odd-job earnings came in a little extra, he would immediately go grab a drink. At such times, the normally silent man would become an extraordinarily chatty person.

He was a large man with prominent cheekbones, and whenever he laughed, an unusually great number of deep wrinkles would form across his forehead and around his mouth. Whenever Mr. Kuma was spotted going on errands with a medicine bottle or such dangling from his left hand, children would gather behind him and, “Cripple Mr. Kuma, what time is it now…” they would shout at the top of their lungs as a matter of course. Then Mr. Kuma would show those familiar wrinkles, “Fifteen o’clock meko-meko!”

he would answer, strike a strange pose, and put on a dance. Mr. Kuma was an ardent war denier. The wispy beard he still kept even then served as a keepsake from his soldiering days. A decorated veteran of both the Sino-Japanese and Russo-Japanese Wars, he had sustained the injuries that took his arm and leg at the Battle of Shoushan Fortress. The Blue Ribbon Medal and lump sum of over a hundred yen had been exchanged for both his wife of many years and his missing arm—leaving Mr. Kuma, who’d never had many relatives to begin with, a disabled man without wife or children.

There was such a story from when the usually quiet Mr. Kuma had once been talking with Father. That was four or five days before the Battle of Shoushan Fortress. We were marching through the night to reinforce the Third Company of our regiment that was supposed to be on the front lines. As we advanced along the railway tracks through sorghum fields, we heard gunfire echoing ceaselessly in the distance. It was that moment—after days of forced marches and food shortages had left our minds drained like cotton—when hearing those gunshots grow fiercer as we approached filled us with taut tension, making even our own footsteps seem to reverberate in our eardrums.

“Halt!” The company commander’s piercing voice rang out. At the very moment everyone froze in bewilderment, a war cry—“Waaah!”—from far ahead on the battlefield momentarily overwhelmed even the gunfire as it resounded. The company commander appeared to deliberate briefly before dispatching five scouts, then immediately ordered the full unit to “Advance!” Though unclear whether the assault came from friend or foe, the situation reached a temporary lull as the gunfire gradually subsided.

After they had thoroughly tramped through the sorghum fields, there spread an expansive wilderness—gently sloping yet severely uneven, slightly open—where to the right a railway line glistened desolately, while beyond a shadowed depression resembling a hollow, sorghum fields again rolled in undulating waves.

Then, from over two hundred meters ahead, came the war cries of a great many voices—"Waaah! Waaah!"

And then, the company commander immediately, “Take cover!”

When he had given the order, they all assumed prone firing positions and waited for the next command.

However,

“Waaah! Waaah!” As the voices drew nearer, they became undeniably strange. It was obviously not a charge, but if they were Japanese forces, there seemed to be no need for them to raise war cries while retreating—and the company commander was deliberating. At that moment, two scouts came running back and reported. “The front line has been occupied by the enemy. X Company and X Company appear to be all wounded…” The company commander, while watching the approaching shadowy mass of roughly one company’s worth of troops, seemed to resolve himself. He ordered, “Assume prone firing positions,” then regripped his command sword and lay prone himself.

From two hundred meters away, they gradually closed in—one hundred meters…………—but the company commander did not issue the next order. And what struck them as utterly strange were those very war cries—while they hadn’t seemed so from a distance, as they drew nearer, they became unmistakably feeble: “Waaah! Waaah!” It was exactly like a chorus chanting Buddhist sutras.

The company commander hesitated, trying several times to move his command sword. And finally, when the numerous dark figures had drawn within over a hundred meters, one of the scouts came running back and reported. “Lieutenant, sir! The troops ahead are the wounded soldiers of X Company and X Company, who are in the process of retreating.” “Over.” They were startled and moved closer—and what in the world was this? The war cries… It was the weeping of retreating wounded soldiers. It was the hollow, weeping voices of grown men.

“That company had nearly all been wounded.” “I’ve forgotten the name of that land, but it was a fierce battle.” “Even now, that strange weeping still lingers in my ears—but I didn’t understand those madman-like cries until I was wounded myself at Shoushan Fortress, see.”

Mr. Kuma could not hold a rice bowl. And he was rather clumsy.

“It would’ve been far better to die in battle than live on half-alive like this.”

Saying this, Mr. Kuma covered his face with the hand holding the chopsticks and wept—this I remember.