Phenomeno:Raven Notes: Part Two

『Raven Notes』 -- 「The Raven's Memorandum」 or 「The story that gets devoured」 「Part Two」

That sound I heard from across the receiver--

The materials of the school building, which were being reinforced against earthquakes, had suddenly collapsed.

Countless students had assembled in the courtyard of the university Kimihiko attended, and as I pushed my way through the crowd, I heard them say, "A student was caught under it", "The ambulance still isn’t here?", "Hurry up and help him out", but also mixed in were voices that plunged relentlessly in my ears, "It's too late", "There's no way he could have survived that."

And then -- through a gap in the crowd, I saw it.

Sticking out from a gap in the pile of reddish-brown steel beams, was Kimihiko's sneaker. A familiar set of jeans. And as if engulfed around it, a reddish-black liquid was seeping into the ground. I was overcome by a strong urge to vomit, and was unable to take a single step forward, eventually I was swept away to the edge of the crowd by the arrival of the paramedics and the university staff leading the way.

After that -- I can't remember much. My head was hot, and there was only confusion as all the sounds blended together. I don't know how much time passed – and before I’d realized, I’d dizzily wandered off, with my hand still clutching the cell phone that was connected to Kimihiko's line. When I snapped out of it, I found myself at the rooftop garden of a station building where Kimihiko and I occasionally visited, and from there, I stared blankly in the direction of the university building.

The scene reflected in my eyes was fogged white, as if I were dreaming. The early-summer wind swayed my hair, and the feeling of the wind sweeping through my uniform finally put words back in my throat.

"..... What..... Why..... Why is this happening? What's the man in blue clothing? How on earth could this happen?"

With a soggy, contorted face, I gripped the wire fence at the edge of the rooftop, and repeated the questions directed at no one. Maybe everything was just a dream. Maybe I just misunderstood, and if I went back to university now, I might find Kimihiko standing smiling at me. Those sneakers and jeans, they might have belonged to someone else -- I tried to tell myself that, but my legs didn’t move an inch from there.

Suddenly, I heard some kind of flapping sound above me, and raised my head.

There were several ravens perched on the rooftop fence. Their obsidian eyes were all directed toward me, and they cawed as if jeering at me. Their cawing made it appear as if they were trying to tell me something important, and yet, as if they understood that it would never get through.

"Please... tell me..."

I glared at the ravens and spoke.

"If you know something... if you know what's happening, if you know..."

Please, tell me.

As I was about to shout that -- I heard it.

"What's my name?"

With a shuddering chill--

I slowly turned around, and before me was a blue so bright it felt like it would pierce my eyes.

●

...That's right.

That day -- I was asked that.

I definitely met the "Man dressed in blue," and was asked that question.

【…Continue?】

From across the Internet, that text emerged.

【What I want to know is past that.】

Abruptly, those words shook.

--Was it truly alright to remember?

Right now, I was helplessly being controlled by the other's pace. I felt like I was on a trolley headed straight toward the abyss. And it was a trolley on a track with no turnouts to be found anywhere you looked. There was no escape, and I couldn’t help but feel that I had no chance of winning this conversation from the start.

"It can’t be that the guy on the other side is really..."

A nasty feeling crawled up from under my feet--

Despite that, I was unable to stop the scene spreading itself out into my mind.

●

Blue, blue, blue, blue.

They seemed to float in the white hazy world. The coat, shirt, necktie, slacks, and the hat pulled over their eyes -- someone stood there, entirely in a blue that seemed to be submerged in the sky.

"Y... you’re..."

In that place where time seemed to have stopped, I heard my voice as if it belonged to someone else.

"What is my name?"

The tone of their voice felt nostalgic, very familiar, and had a creepiness in it that I didn't want to admit. With that kind of chilling undertone, they calmly asked.

"Y... you... could you be..."

In response, they slowly tilted their hat, and showed me the face underneath.

Yes – it was…

Holding the hat in one hand, their long, black hair flowed downwards.

It was me.

Covered entirely in blue clothing, and smiling, was, without a doubt, "me".

As I held back the immense urge to vomit rising from the bottom of my stomach, I finally understood. The voice, which sounded somewhat familiar, was uncomfortable, as if I were listening to a recording of my own voice. I felt the terror of seeing an impossible phenomenon, as if one’s shadow was moving differently from oneself, as if something that was not supposed to rebel had begun to rebel.

"What is the name of my child?"

Chuckling at my expression – the one dressed in blue continued questioning.

However, that face was...

"...............!!?"

On top of that blue dress, where my face had been until now, now had the pale face of my mother, who was supposed to be dead.

I see -- I remembered now. At last, the despair from that time I had almost forgotten was taking shape.

Your self asks for your own name. Your mother asks for the child's name. In either case, the answer is "Your name". That's why people end up answering their name when questioned by the one dressed in blue.

And this time, the blue-clothed took something out of its suit pocket. But I understood without even seeing it. I believed the final question would be about the box.

"What is inside this box?"

What the blue-clothed presented together with that expected question -- was a sleek, white, porcelain funerary urn. The face of the blue-clothed was now crumbled. The pieces of flesh had peeled away to reveal a white, cracked skull.

--Grim Reaper.

I knew it. This was a Grim Reaper. And the "three questions" were there to lead me into saying "My name" in every way. However -- I couldn't figure out why it was using such indirect means. And the meaning behind the blue clothing, where it came from, and why only I could see it. I didn't know, but in any case, the one thing I knew was that if I answered those questions, the next one to be taken would be me. I frantically stood my ground as my legs trembled, and pursed my lips. I clenched my teeth hard, defiant against answering a thing.

More so than fear -- my body trembled out of frustration.

In some ways, I had thought that facing death head on would be something more refreshing, something that would push me beyond resignation. You know, like hearing soothing hymns in an endless world filled with light, or seeing the Sanzu River in a world of white haze. But instead, I was disappointed that it was in this roundabout and cowardly way. At any rate, that urn probably had my name written on it. This asshole was probably trying to get me to say my name in different ways. It was too underhanded. Too vile. I wished from the bottom of my stomach that I could do something to hit back, even a little bit, when—

I noticed the name etched onto the urn.

由貴子 ○○ (Yukiko ○○).

My name was there, but one of the letters was wrong.

My name was由起子 ○○. It was given to me with the wish that no matter what happened, I would be a girl that always got up with my own strength. I remembered my mother’s effusive smile, as she explained that to me. It was a smile from a time when there was no rift between me and my mother.

.....Why did my mother and I grow so distant?

....When did I start keeping myself distant from her?

It was since the day that I learned my mother still kept a letter from an old lover. My mother said that it wasn’t an easy thing to throw away a person’s feelings, but I couldn't help but feel like that was an act of betrayal toward our family. But I realized when I saw that letter during the time of her funeral. That old lover had long since passed away. He was an existence that couldn't affect our family anymore. Maybe my mother couldn't throw it away because he had passed away. Maybe she thought that if she were to throw away the proof of his life, then he would truly be dead.

Those thoughts suddenly swept through me -- and the world gradually blotted out.

As long as we're alive, we can overwrite our sadness with happy memories. But the dead can't come back. You can't talk to them anymore – Wasn’t that what mother wanted to tell me?

"Hey, you....."

The simmering anger welled up inside me, and I opened my mouth.

"If you're a grim reaper -- don't get people’s names wrong!"

My.

My name.

My precious name, which my mother gave me.

The moment I was about to shout my correct name--

That color flowed into the white, foggy world.

--Red?

It was the color of a ransel.

There was a young girl with a bright red ransel on her back.

●

【--Her.】

Just as the old man on the other side of the LCD typed,

"..... I see." I also whispered.

-- I see, so that's how it was.

I finally remembered everything. I realized why the memories had almost disappeared from my mind.

"That was close."

"You were asking for my name again, weren't you."

My head became flushed with red at the brutal truth.

Yes -- I hadn't forgotten.

My story had already been thoroughly devoured.

"You came here to remind me of ‘my name’, the name you failed to steal that day, the name I sealed away myself, and to make me say it myself --That's why you're here, isn't it?"

●

"Don't fall for it."

At that moment, my mind was filled with someone's posts that appeared on that occult site's bulletin board. Those words overlapped with the vivid image of a young girl with a red ransel.

Yes, someone somewhere who posted on that message board had said that.

Be careful of the final question.

The box. The name inscribed on it.

My name, written incorrectly.

.....It was deliberate.

The blue-clothed wrote my name wrong on purpose.

Or rather... would a Grim Reaper really do that? Maybe it wasn’t a Grim Reaper at all? Then what was this thing? And -- who was that elementary school kid, and how did she know?

At that moment, I saw the blue-clothed slowly turn around. Acknowledging the unexpected presence of the young girl, it straightened its posture slightly.

The girl moved softly, silently accepting the gaze that looked as if would take the breath of life away.

Slowly raising her small right arm, she pointed somewhere.

It was towards -- the top of the rooftop fence. There, where only a few ravens perched just a moment ago, now had enough of a flock to cover the sky in black, gazing at me as if they were ready to carry me to the other side. They must have seen everything that happened until now. And rather than interject, they simply observed. What the blue-clothed was, who the girl was, and what was happening here now, they understood it all, yet they just watched. Up until now -- and from here onward, they would simply watch countless thoughts crumble into the eternal river of time.

You shouldn't speak of it. If you speak of it, you become involved.

--Then, then, what should I do?

What should I do, having become involved up until now?

At that moment, I felt like I heard the echo of a wind chime that might have been misplaced and forgotten somewhere.

Was that the young girl's voice -- that was the one thing I couldn't remember no matter how much I tried. But, those words that sounded like a wind chime suddenly descended into my head.

"Throw away your name."

--Throw away my name? Why did I need to throw away my name?

But oddly, I understood that it was correct, and that it was the only way to escape from here. Otherwise, I would be pursued relentlessly until I died. But -- but, that was impossible. This name was mine, and mine alone. It was the mark of who I was, engraved into me with earnest hopes and prayers when I was born into this world. To throw that away would mean to throw away all that I held dear. If I threw away my name -- I would become nobody. My connection with my family, my friends, and loved ones that I spun up to this point would be cut off.

I tearfully complained, but the girl with the ransel silently stared at me.

The girl simply let her long, beautiful black hair dance in the wind. Even though we were so far apart, the elegance of that child’s facial features was strikingly apparent. Extremely, extremely, beautiful -- no, that explanation didn't do her justice. The young girl was like a bisque doll that a famous craftsman placed heart and soul into as their life’s final work. There was a bizarre dissonance that inspired awe in the viewer, one that made you feel like she couldn't possibly exist in this world. It was in the girl's eyes. Her face, as if blessed by God, and her eyes, as if loved by the Devil, elevated her beauty to awe.

The girl looked at me with her dark eyes that looked as if they might swallow me, and nodded her head.

"..........Ah."

When I realized it, I felt a blast of cold air tear across my skin. When I realized that it was not exuding from the blue-clothed, but rather from the black eyes of the girl with the red ransel, the tears I'd been holding back for so long spilled out helplessly. I'd been holding back, thinking that if I cried, I would lose – but, I couldn't hold back anymore.

--That girl already had no name. She'd long since thrown it away. Even... even though she was so young. Even though she was still only six or seven. She had already gone through something that forced her to throw away her name, and had shown up just to tell me about it.

"My name is?"

And, then -- the blue-clothed me asked me, with a furious expression.

I managed to steady my knees, which were on the verge of collapsing, and looked at the black-haired girl as if clinging to her. She was still pointing. Pointing at the ravens.

As I cried, I thought of my mother’s wide smile.

--If you die, it's over. As long as you're alive, you'll find happy things. You can just store the name within your soul. Give it to the person who wants it.

I nodded--

And managed to block out the name that rose in my heart, and that day, I declared:

"I'm, Karasu."

"I know everything, yet I travel the darkness between this world and the next without telling, ‘Karasu’."

◎

I was in my room.

【Ahh -- failed, again.】

When I came to, he disappeared from the internet, leaving behind only those words, which felt like they were accompanied by a wry smile. Wiping my sweaty palms with a handkerchief, I slowly closed the browser. I was able to simply close it without any issues. I tried opening the browser again and checked my browsing history: it contained the dating site, but no history after that.

I rubbed my eyes, and slightly opened my mouth in exasperation. I took out a cigarette with my trembling fingers, and placed it in my mouth. Without lighting it, I leaned back in my chair, and looked up at the ceiling.

--Jeez, really. Just, jeez.

Since that day, I had lived my life having thrown away my real name. That's why I'd forgotten all the memories engraved in that name.

"A memorandum indeed -- quite a memorandum."

☆☆☆

Having written that far, I stopped my fingers.

On the LCD display of my tablet, all that was displayed was my own words, inscribed in a voluminous amount.

I quickly scanned through it again, and suddenly felt odd. At the same time, I felt vaguely fearful about why I was even trying to write down a memorandum in the first place. I'd never even kept a diary before. After being in two minds about whether or not to delete it -- I ultimately saved the text, and tossed it in my personal folder. I then turned off the device and put it away in my bag.

I was alone in a taxi, passing through the city at night when it was already dark.

I squinted at the headlights of passing cars, gazing absent-mindedly at the illumination in front of the train station, and suddenly thought. If I hadn't thrown away my name back then -- would I have died young like Haruka-chan, my mother and Kimihiko?

I didn't know. Did they die because the "blue-clothed" appeared, or did the "blue-clothed" appear because their deaths had been decided; I didn’t even know that. Speaking of not knowing -- where I was right now, and whether I was really alive, were unclear sometimes. For instance, do the people walking outside of this taxi window truly exist? The countless bluish-white artificial lights look like special fluorescent lamps for tropical fish, and the people feel like a school of Neon Tetras swimming in an aquarium. Like an aquarium that’s named, ‘Endless dream’.

No -- come to think of it, I hadn't dreamed in a while. But that was not because I was always in a deep sleep; I was surely seeing something similar to a dream, but I felt a sense of loss, as if I had been completely deprived of that spectacle at the cost of waking up in this world again.

But, once in a while--

Sometimes when I woke up, I felt the vestiges of something.

That was the sound of crying. I realized that it was like the voices of countless ravens crying somewhere.

The cries that were trying to tell me something important, yet those cries that could never be understood, might have been engraved deeply and sharply in my pure white dream world. Maybe it was the resentful lament of a raven somewhere that had taken my place.

In the end, I never found out whether that blue-clothed was the devil, a grim reaper, or some wandering ghost. Even so, I was sure that the true form of the blue-clothed was the time of death itself, like a check with no name on it. I still didn’t know why such an irrational being wandered around this world, but it was something that functioned the moment you inscribed your name on it.

And I, who had inscribed a false name on it--

What kind of death will I have on that day when it comes?

I, myself, who will have died, would hardly understand such a thing, but for some reason, I thought it would not be a pretty death. There would be no beautiful face on my body that people could decorate flowers with at my funeral, and I’m sure they would say it was better not to see -- no, it might even be the kind of funeral where my corpse doesn't even look like one. Something that had been waiting for me to die for a long time swarmed me at once, scattering about as if devouring "death" itself--

And then, I abruptly remembered that word.

Lucifer Blue.

Wasn't that blueish-white light used to light aquariums called that?

"I see."

I smiled coldly, and gently reached my finger to the people on the other side of the window glass, meandering about like tropical fish. The tip of my finger touched the glass, and I realized once more that I could not reach them.

From their point of view, I might be the tropical fish in the glass.

And they must be trying to reach out their fingers to me from time to time. The fingertips that I could never see. But it seemed that the other side couldn’t find my location either.

○

"Welcome! Will you be dining alone?"

As soon as I entered the family restaurant for the offline meeting, I was greeted by a cute waitress.

"Hmm, well..."

I glanced around the restaurant, with its bright pop music and -- ahh, someone had arrived ahead of me.

The newbie to the occult site ‘Ikaigabuchi’ was known for being a bit of a wuss was sitting alone, writing what seemed to be a letter rather fervently.

I tried to creep up behind the host of today's offline meeting, when--

Suddenly, a cold wind swept through my heart.

Together with that damp presence of death, the scene from that day suddenly came back to me.

That young girl with the red ransel who appeared on the rooftop back then.

Her cold, inorganic beauty and lonely appearance were vividly drawn before me.

"--Ah, so that's how it is."

What if the young girl from back then was real, and still alive somewhere?

And what if she was still suffering alone beyond the darkness?

Thereupon, I swallowed my words, and silently closed my eyes.

The ravens always know everything. And they never speak of it.

That is why they are ominous, and beautiful. Because they can see all of what their words would bring about. Because in the end, one’s destiny cannot be altered by another. Because they know how sinful it was to casually speak of what they could see.

Starting over from today – that became my guideline.

.....Eh? Wasn't fortune-telling a combination of cold reading and hot reading, an occult style of therapy? Yep, that's exactly right.

But I did say generally, didn't I?

That means, of course, that there are exceptions--

Because this world is an abyss after all, one that is endlessly entertaining.

---

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