“Go to hell!!”

I threw one broken half of the shovel handle toward the attacker’s face. I hit this time, but it did not seem to do much damage.

All I needed was to buy some time.

I frantically stood up and strengthened my grip on the other half of the broken handle.

I had no time for hesitation.

The handle had been rotting to pieces already. I could not stop the attacker by striking with or throwing it.

And so...

I held it with both hands as if it was a knife and immediately stabbed the jagged broken edge of the handle into the attacker’s thigh.

“Gyah!?”

I felt a soft sensation.

I did not want to think about whether that came from the rotting handle or the attacker’s leg.

“Gh, ghh! Ah, ah, ah!?”

The attacker fell to the side. The small snakes covering the attacker’s head scattered in an instant as if slipping in amongst the dead grass. The sight of something stabbing into his leg must have been a shock to the attacker because he used both hands in an attempt to pull the remains of the handle out of his leg.

Yes, he used both of the hands he had been using to hold the pitchfork.

“You bastard...”

When the attacker heard my voice, he seemed to finally catch on to the situation. He realized I had swiped the giant pitchfork he had let go of.

And I was swinging that pitchfork up above my head.

“If you’re!! Gonna try to stab people with this!! Don’t get so upset!! When someone!! Attacks you back!!!!!!”

I swung it down again and again.

The farm tool was designed like a giant fork, so it would not stab into someone unless thrust straight at them. However, I was essentially beating him with a blunt weapon similar to a wooden sword with a metal weight on the end. It could easily break a bone.

I was able to rationally analyze that in my head, but I could not stop my arms.

I could feel something boiling up in my mind.

“Ahhhhhhhhhhh!! Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!”

I let out a great roar.

I could not stand anything. I could not stand how the attacker was curling up and covering his head with his hands as if he was the victim. He had been doing whatever he wanted a minute ago, but this was how he acted once someone attacked back. I decided to continue beating him until his true nature had been fully revealed.

“Shinobu-kun?”

I then heard a familiar voice.

Madoka had come by to check on me. She seemed to be peeking around a corner of the shack.

“Shinobu-kun, wait!! You can’t go any further than this! You’ll kill him!!”

“Pant!! Pant!!”

My hands were trembling. I was breathing heavily. I stopped swinging down the pitchfork, but my fingers were so stiff with tension and anger that they refused to obey my commands. As if I was waiting for a numb leg to recover, I would have to wait a moment before being able to let go of the pitchfork.

The attacker was curled up in the fetal position.

The person who lay trembling on the ground was a man in his forties or fifties with a beard covering his entire face and wearing clothes that looked like dirty old rags.

“Who are you?”

Pain returned to my head as if it had only just now recalled being struck.

As Madoka helped support my shaky body, I shouted toward the attacker lying on the dead grass.

“Who the hell are you!?”

Part 14 (Uchimaku Hayabusa)

More than twenty years before, Hasebe Michio had been sentenced to death for the crime of killing the president of Kuroyama Electronics Group, but he had disappeared during transport while a retrial was being requested.

He had vanished in the vast private property of the Kuroyama Electronics Group. Although no evidence had been found, it was possible the Kuroyama Electronics Group had abducted him.

The key to this mystery was the surveillance recordings of the security company.

According to the mystery freak’s speculation, the communications interference in the Four Mountains basin came from jamming devices. She also theorized a large number of wired cameras and sensors had been secretly installed. If that was true, it could be an important clue to Hasebe Michio’s location whether Kuroyama was guilty or not.

Even if the Kuroyama Electronics Group had nothing to do with his disappearance, it was possible the higher ups and old members of the regional police saw him as a nuisance as well. Either way, every second counted.

“But, detective, this is the Kuroyama Electronics Group’s independent territory. You have no authority right now, so I doubt anyone will hand over the video recordings if you ask.”

“They have absolute control here, but this independent territory is not all that large,” I said while driving the rental car down the road we had come on. “Seventy percent of the security companies in the country that specialize in corporations have either their headquarters or Japanese branch office in Tokyo.”

“I see. You think you can get the recordings if you go after the Tokyo headquarters? And fortunately, your Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department badge has unrivalled power when used in Tokyo.”

“Even if the Kuroyama Electronics Group has the local guards on their side, they might not have influence over everyone at the distant headquarters. And the guards will have no choice but to obey the regulations of their company. The video footage will be sent to a server at their headquarters for storage.”

“That means we just need to know exactly what security company to check. But everyone at the gate wore a factory uniform with nothing indicating the security company.”

“We need to check the cable that the footage is sent over. Different companies have different standard infrastructure they use. If I have the desk group back at the Metropolitan Police Department check which companies use which cables, we can track them down.”

“Do we have to search that entire thick forest?”

“Are you testing me?” I gave a scornful laugh. “As the name suggests, Four Mountains is surrounded by mountains. They’ll use the tunnels to pass the cables through. The cables will be buried along the shortest route between the factory and the nearest tunnel. That would be the one through Seiryuu Mountain.”

We naturally moved from the Four Mountains’ center junction as we moved toward the location connecting the outer tunnel and the semiconductor factory.

After a while, the distance from the factory caused the menace of nature to suddenly close in on us.

“...The road is disappearing.”

“Let’s get out and deal with this quickly. The only people here are with Kuroyama, so nothing good will come of being found investigating the corporation.”

I opened the driver’s side door and the unpleasantly moist air quickly rushed in. It was fog, but it was not refreshingly cool. It was somehow hot, humid, and moist.

The mystery freak stepped out from the passenger seat, placed her hands on her hips, and looked out across the dried up and rotting forest.

“Wow, this is horrid. This forest is so thick I wouldn’t be surprised to find a few inconvenient corpses.”

“There’s something wrong with you if corpses are the first thing a forest brings to mind.”

“If we do find the model number for the cable, what do we do then? We can’t use our phones, but don’t tell me we will head all the way back to Tokyo.”

“The signal is only affected in this basin between the mountains. We only have to pass through the tunnel and leave Four Mountains to use our phones. I will report the situation to my coworkers and then we wait for information at a service area. Once we have a clue concerning Hasebe Michio, we can begin tracking him again.”

“I see. In that case, let’s use the tunnel through Genbu Heights! The moonlight service area has a pink ice cream that is supposed to grant love between the two who eat it together!!”

“That would be embarrassing to do with a lover, so why would you want to do it with a complete stranger? In fact, I’m still not sure why the two of us have been driving long distances together on the highway.”

“So you admit using the highway together like this has been a sign of our love!? In that case, I’m prepared to give you a fan service scene you will never forget!”

Saying anything would only have made it worse, so I ignored her and made my way into the forest.

As I headed deeper while stepping forcefully on the ground, I noticed something odd not even 10 meters in. I crouched down and moved a rotting black object at my feet that might have been humus or organic waste. And then I found it.

Something like a concrete ditch cut across. However, it was not meant for rainwater like a ditch in a residential area. It was a concrete covering prepared to prevent wild animals from digging up or biting through the exposed cables.

The cover was divided into blocked sections about 50 centimeters across. I grabbed one of them and forced it up.

Spider webs and earth had made their way inside, but I spotted a cable as thick as my thumb inside. It was covered in black plastic that had the same string of numbers printed at set intervals.

I took my cell phone from my suit pocket and photographed the cable.

“That should do it. Hey, mystery freak, I have the information we needed. Let’s get back to the car. If we pass through the tunnel and stop at the nearest service area...”

I trailed off because something seemed odd.

The mystery freak was not responding.

I turned around and found only the dense forest and thick fog. Enbi had been causing so much noise before, but she was completely gone. I could not even hear her voice.

“Hey...?”

Is she messing around and trying to surprise me?

With that silly thought in mind, I glanced around.

And then...

A dull impact suddenly ran through the bridge of my nose.

“Bah...!?”

My vision flashed white. All strength left my knees and I crumbled to the ground.

Someone...hit me? And on the nose...? They were right in front of me!? When and how did they get that close? I didn’t even see their face!!

Footsteps through the underbrush circled around.

They circled around behind me.

A slender arm wrapped around my neck from behind. Vise-like strength began strangling me. The flow of blood was cut off more than the flow of air and an intense heat swelled up in my head. From the soft sensation on my back, I could just barely surmise this attacker was female, but that was all the information I had.

My vision spun around.

This was a sign of my thoughts and consciousness leaving due to the lack of blood to my head.

And just before I fully lost consciousness...

“Oh, c’mon. Pass out already. Or are you enjoying my breasts?”

I heard a familiar abusive voice in my ear.

Hishigami Mai... What are...you doing here?

Part 15 (Hishigami Mai)

Honestly.

Searching for Hasebe Michio who had disappeared from the highway? That incident I had picked up over the police radio was likely what they were here for, but Kuroyama Electronics Group had nothing to do with that. I had my own annoying issues to deal with. I couldn’t have them messing it all up with their amateurish investigation.

I threw the detective and my little sister in their rental car while they took a carefree nap. For an instant, I seriously considered stripping them both naked and positioning them in an embrace, but I stopped myself at the last second. I was on a job, so it was no time to be having fun.

Instead, I left a memo telling them Kuroyama Electronics Group was the wrong direction and they needed to look into Youkai if they wanted to find Hasebe. I of course added a note that I would physically punish them if they did not burn the memo in the car’s ashtray after reading it.

A dull electronic tone sounded.

It came from the radio I had been given by the semiconductor factory. It used a band that could slip through the jamming.

“Hello, hello.”

“Do you get it now that you’ve seen for yourself? No obvious footprints have been left. That’s the problem.”

The voice belonged to an elderly man who could easily be described as “stern”, but he seemed to have some malice following him around. He was like a diligent prisoner who would maintain the guillotine meant to be used on him. ...But given the nature of the factory, that might have been more than just a metaphor.

“If you understand, return to the factory. We have mountains of troublesome issues to take care of.”

“Understood. I’ll be right back.”

I had frantically made up an excuse to leave the factory and ensure my sister and the detective did not step on any strange landmines, so I couldn’t exactly argue. And it was true we didn’t have much time.

I sat in the driver’s seat of a small Kuroyama Electronics Group company car. I simply could not get used to electric cars. Without the roar of the engine, I could sometimes forget just how fast I was driving.

However, I did like the beckoning cat bottle cap dolls lined up on the dashboard.

How many of those are there again?

“U-um,” began the small dog sitting obediently in the passenger seat.

Technically, he was a harmless canine Youkai called a Sunekosuri.

“Should you have really left those people like that?”

“I gave them a chance. In a case needing my involvement, this is almost a miracle. If they continue their misguided attack on Kuroyama despite my kindness, there’s no saving them. I need to focus on my own job.”

“B-but wasn’t one of them your sister?”

“Try not to bring that up. The situation is a bit unique when it comes to Hishigami women. Well, just think of my abandoning her as being a form of trust.”

I drove along in the electric car for a while longer before speaking once more.

“Sunekosuri, how are you faring?”

“F-fine. I have gotten a bit used to it, but...ugh. This should be a rural area...so why do I feel so bad?”

“This is the opposite of a carefully maintained Intellectual Village. This is made for machines. It’s disguised as natural, but it is actually filled with artificial aspects. It’s a tough environment for a Youkai like you.”

I arrived at the main entrance to the semiconductor factory. I showed the guard my temporary guest ID and slowly drove the car inside the wall.

The atmosphere suddenly changed.

Anyone who saw the inside would likely notice a certain fact. The exceptionally tall outer wall and the barbed wire were not merely meant to stop industrial spies from getting in.

The fog, the air, and everything else were trapped inside this space.

Yes. All of that equipment was also used to keep anyone from escaping.

“As you know,” said the elderly man over the radio as I brought the car around to the parking lot. “This looks like a large scale semiconductor factory and it does in fact create and ship out goods, but its true purpose lies elsewhere. This is a facility to imprison anyone who commits a serious breach of the corporation’s trust. If someone commits an act of industrial espionage by bringing internal documents out, they will be transferred here.”

A breach of trust and industrial espionage, hm?

Does that also apply to employees who recommend making certain internal documents public or the victims of products that accidentally catch fire?

“I have heard it referred to as the corporate prison, but what is its official name?” I asked.

“It has no name. After all, it would be a problem if any records of it remained. That is what kind of place this is. We have the equipment needed and we can even overwrite common sense here.”

“Who would have ever thought the nation’s leading large scale factory with over 8000 employees is actually mostly automated and can run with only a few SEs?”

“The technology is not all that rare. Factories only remain manned to protect employment and to prevent the few workers actually needed from going insane from loneliness.”

In other words, the 8000 workers were completely unnecessary.

Not only did they not touch the production factory’s equipment, but they were not even allowed in the same building.

historical

So...

“The facility is made up of 5000 foolish prisoners and 3000 jailers including you,” said the man. “No information can be allowed out and a prisoner escaping is out of the question. The prisoners here will die here. No other path is allowed for them.”

I see. I see.

However, the cameras and sensors set up throughout the forest seemed to have a different meaning than the high walls and barbed wire. What were they for? They seemed less like a distribution of neatly optimized security and more like they were needlessly setting them up wherever they could. It was as if they could not find something they wanted to find.

I grabbed the radio and opened the car door.

The Sunekosuri hopped out through my door and onto the parking lot.

As I stood on the asphalt, I slammed the door shut and spoke into the radio.

“But you say the prisoners and jailers vanished into thin air at some point.”

Simply put, that was the circumstances surrounding the corporate prison.

With the use of the facility’s “abilities”, capturing Hasebe Michio who the detective and my sister were pursuing might indeed have been simple.

However, we were caught up in our own dangerous problem, so we had more important things to do.

As I walked from the parking lot to a giant structure of the factory, the elderly man and I continued to speak.

“Everyone disappeared leaving just a few prisoners and jailers behind,” he said. “I thought it was a mass jailbreak with most of the jailers taken hostage...but it is just too thorough. Also, there is no sign of the locks being broken or anything like that. It is unclear if they were made to vanish by someone else or if they made themselves vanish.”

“I see. So you are desperate for a solution.”

“This corporate prison is strong. Even if the escaped prisoners testify on the public stage, Kuroyama Electronics Group will not go under. However, crushing even the slightest risk is the best option.”

That was not surprising. If you included even the foreign affiliated companies, this was a corporation connected to over 150 thousand people. Any illegal operations they were involved in would be assisted by expert groups, making the structure of it all quite complex.

But if 5000 prisoners escaped and 3000 jailers were sacrificed, that elderly man would not escape blame.

He appeared calm, but he would likely be thrown into the one of those prisoner cells if the situation was not quickly resolved.

And that was why someone like me had been called in.

I had used a fictional ID that only existed online to be mistaken for a “complaint handler” who worked for a company affiliated with Kuroyama and handled any dirty jobs.

“We do not have time to treat you like a guest even if you are a temporary worker. Do your job. Depending on what happens, it is entirely possible you will be thrown into one of these cells in the future. Do not screw this up.”

The Sunekosuri at my feet looked up with a worried expression.

Wah hah hah! Are you lonely? Then feel free to rub up against my leg!!

“Then let’s handle this in the standard way,” I said. “We reveal what exactly occurred, determine who did it, compare that to the balance of power between different groups to guess at their motive, and finally track down where the missing people are.”

“If they have left the facility, that alone is grounds for shooting them. We know how to handle the bodies, so you can leave the cleanup to us.”

“Understood. By the way, you know what the most likely possibility is, don’t you?”

“A Youkai?”

I sighed at that immediate reply.

The young lady of Hyakki Yakou had requested that I investigate the circumstances surrounding Four Mountain’s semiconductor factory because they were catching glimpses of something dangerous there.

But the situation I found made me want a bonus.

After all, Hasebe Michio’s disappearance meant the problem went beyond the corporate prison.

Now then. What are the conditions behind this strange phenomenon and how far has it spread?

“Okay. I’ll start by investigating from that end of things.”

What a pain.

If I only needed evidence of a crime, I could just record this conversation and submit it. Why did the prisoners who are the biggest piece of evidence have to vanish into thin air!?

Part 16 (Jinnai Shinobu)

The villagers of the abandoned Zenmetsu Village were rumored to have been slaughtered. Someone there was still trying to harm intruders using farm tools such as a pitchfork.

The man must not have bathed in a long time because his hair and beard were unkempt and his skin was discolored from dark stains.

His clothes were so dirty their original color was impossible to determine and they were so tattered that I could not even imagine what kind of clothes they had originally been.

Who was he?

The man had been balled up after I assaulted him, but when I asked him that, he used his trembling jaw to somehow force out some words.

“...No. It wasn’t me.”

“Who are you?”

“I...I... I didn’t do it!! I didn’t do anything! That’s why I’m still running. I didn’t kill anyone!!”

“I’m asking who you are!!”

The man jumped in fright when I shouted at him with the stolen pitchfork in hand.

I had a feeling Madoka was looking at me with horribly, horribly cold eyes.

I understood why.

I had been chased around a strange village, struck hard on the head, and driven to the verge of death. Being released from that state seemed to be keeping me from controlling my emotions very well. It was like releasing a compressed spring.

On top of that, I now held the weapon I had been so afraid of. Even I could tell this was making me overly bold.

It was not surprising that she was annoyed by my actions.

But I could not let this chance slip by. I would not let myself be dropped into that abyss again.

“...Yokoeda Tadashi.”

“Why were you swinging this at us? What are you doing here? Are you the mass murderer from over 30 years ago or are you some psycho copycat camping here?”

“N-no!! It wasn’t me! I only live here! I’ve always lived in this village!!”

“Then what’s with this?”

I thrust the rusted tines of the pitchfork in front of Yokoeda’s nose and he turned his head as if to look away from something unpleasant.

“I-I needed it for self defense. Given the location, horrible people often come here as a test of courage or something. The worst ones are the drunk ones. I can’t rely on the police, so I have to drive them off myself. Come to think of it, what are you doing here?”

“Hey, mister,” cut in Madoka. “If you know this place is so dangerous, why are you still living here? The homeless are not meant to pick fruit and hunt boars. In fact, I think they can only survive in a city with a certain level of development.”

“...It’s necessary.” Yokoeda’s gaze moved from place to place again and again in order to escape everyone else’s gaze. “It’s necessary. I’m the final survivor of those born here. And staying here in Four Mountains will make them rush things. If that causes them to make a mistake...”

“Who do you mean by ‘them’?”

“The Kuroyama Electronics Group.” Yokoeda spoke that name quickly. It was as if he were spitting an unpleasant bug out of his mouth as soon as he could. “Don’t you find it suspicious? ...It was after that incident. It all ended thirty years ago in a single night. And immediately after everyone was slaughtered, the Kuroyama Electronics Group moved in. The village was opposed to the semiconductor factory that would suck up so much of the underground water. And then that incident occurred that conveniently got rid of all their opposition.”

Madoka and I exchanged a glance.

She looked confused. My expression was probably similar.

Was he speaking of a truth no one was aware of?

Or was this nothing more than the ramblings of a lonely middle-aged man.

I could not determine which it was, but I could feel some strange sort of weight.

“...”

I tried to ask Madoka’s opinion, but she was keeping a bit of distance from me. This eccentric beauty of a classmate was glancing over at me. Or more specifically, at the end of the giant pitchfork in my hands.

Well, it is dangerous.

I did not know what the man was getting at, but I felt it was best to let him speak if he wanted to.

He needed to vent.

After all...

I had the advantage because I had the weapon with the longest reach.

However, the man could make a desperate last-ditch attack. If he did that, I was not entirely sure I could stab this giant fork into him without hesitating.

If I succeeded, I would be a murderer.

If I failed, I could be killed by that middle-aged man.

In other words, either result would ruin me.

Yokoeda Tadashi continued speaking without realizing my thoughts.

“It was a hot summer day. I...no, everyone my age was talking about having a test of courage. We drew lots to see who would take the test and who would try to scare those taking the test. At first, I thought that was what saved me. But they intentionally left me alive. I stood still in a daze for a while after it happened. The next thing I knew, people were saying I had killed everyone. That was the scenario. They killed them in such over-the-top ways with blood flying up to the ceilings to make it look like a crazy killer had done it and to rob my testimony of all credibility.”

Madoka must have been thinking anyone who might turn violent was dangerous when there were no police or mediators available. She kept her distance from both Yokoeda Tadashi and me as she frowned and asked a question.

It seemed she was trying to create a safe zone by taking a neutral position.

“Hey. You say ‘them’, so was there more than one murderer?”

“How many people do you think were needed to surround and annihilate all of the villagers who fled in every direction? At the very least, I saw five or six men wearing masks, but I don’t know who they were. That is why I’m staying here to worry Kuroyama Electronics Group. I’m staying right next to them.”

At some point, I had withdrawn the pitchfork.

Yokoeda had also sat up on the dead grass and leaned his back against the wall of the shack.

“According to Kuroyama’s scenario, I was supposed to be immediately captured and blamed for it all. But that didn’t happen, so they quickly changed the outcome. Due to certain circumstances, we had lived a life cut off from the outside world in a village of only a few dozen people. No one would cause an uproar over the village’s disappearance. Its disappearance was-->>

next page