This is a story I heard from Shisho. Right after entering university, there was a welcome party for freshmen organized by the senior students of my department. It was in the downtown area near the station. The first party was at an all-you-can-eat shabu-shabu restaurant. The second party was at a German pub run by an alumnus of our course, and I was made to drink a heavy amount of dark beer. I don't remember where we went for the third party. By the time I managed to stagger away from my group—who were dizzy yet still excited about going somewhere else—it must have been close to midnight.
A businessman in a suit walking just as unsteadily with a woman leaning on him, a group of people who looked like college students linking arms and singing on the street, young people squatting at the base of a utility pole while several friends rubbed their backs... With such utterly ordinary sights of a downtown district passing by in my peripheral vision, I walked toward the station, urging on my legs which had lost their shape like liquid. It was when I came to a Chinese restaurant where a clerk in a front apron was putting away a signboard. Ahead in my field of vision, a road intersected perpendicularly with the path I was taking, and something strange was walking across that crossroads.
It wasn't illuminated by streetlights, yet it faintly emitted a light. It looked somewhat human, but was strangely flat, and around where a face should be, the distinction between eyes and nose was unclear. Several such figures were passing across the road ahead from right to left. I instantly intuited that they were not of this world. Originally, I had stronger spiritual awareness than others and frequently encountered ghosts and the like, but seeing them gathered in a crowd like this in the middle of the city was rare.
As I slowly approached the crossroads, I realized that those walking figures were forming a procession and moving in the same direction. Their number was well over ten or twenty. Countless human shadows emerged dimly into the nightlife of the downtown area, walking at a slow pace. It was a chilling sight. The word "spirit road" crossed my mind. Just as ants follow their companions' pheromones in a line along the same path, it was a path taken by wandering spirits guided by something. Right in the middle of such a bustling downtown area...
Apprehensively, I stepped out to the crossroads and peered in the direction the procession was heading. It felt as though it went on forever, but beyond the road, I could see what looked like the head of the line.
At that moment, someone from the procession reached out toward me. By a hair's breadth, I ducked under the hand and put some distance between us. Startled by the unexpected attack, I almost twisted my ankle. My heart was pounding. An unusually long, white hand swayed like a wave as it retreated back into the procession. None of the surrounding people seemed to notice the sight. No one attempted to cross the procession, and those who reached the crossroads turned casually to the left or right. Were they people originally heading that way, or were they unconsciously making a detour so as not to cross the spirit road...?
Meanwhile, they must have reacted to me, who could "see" their existence. Even so, they showed no sign of breaking away from the line to chase after me. Did advancing alongside the procession hold something irresistible? Regaining my balance, I walked briskly in the direction they were heading, staying as far away as possible from those moving down the center of the road.
Glancing sideways at the faintly glowing figures, I caught glimpses of their clothes, expressionless profiles, coagulated blood dripping from shattered and gaping jaws, and a slumped left shoulder revealing a collarbone. Some were clearly visible, while others seemed about to vanish into the darkness. Such "ways of being seen" varied and lacked consistency, but all of them walked on without breaking their stride.
I broke into a light jog and caught up with the head of the procession a couple of blocks ahead. How should I express the sight I saw at that moment? That scene would revive within me countless times at various moments, with a brilliance I could never forget in my lifetime. I stopped involuntarily in front of the darkened sign of a pharmacy and gazed at her profile.
At the very front of the spirit road was a woman. She was wearing a white track suit, both hands shoved into her pockets, slightly hunchbacked, walking with a defiant, upward glare ahead. Her expression was white, as if pregnant with anger, and her eyes— Her eyes were of a color that seemed to hate, spit upon, torment, and yet completely lose interest in everything reflected within them. She walked while scattering irritation, cursing everything that had put her in a bad mood. Behind her, the dimly glowing procession of the dead followed without a sound. I held my breath and watched.
The solemn procession, resembling a funeral march, moved along the bottom of the downtown night, past midnight when the frenzy was beginning to cool. Leading things not of this world, and with an expression that didn't even show whether she was aware of it, she kept walking without looking back, simply glaring straight ahead. Just what about her attracted them like a bug zapper? I took a step forward into that fantastic sight and tried to call out to her as she was about to pass by.
"Excuse me..."
My raised right hand clawed at empty air. She didn't even stop her walk, nor did she spare me a glance, simply parting her lips to speak briefly.
"Get in the back of the line."
And the next moment, she walked away with an unchanged expression, as if she had even forgotten that she had just spoken. Everything appeared in slow motion. Whether the thing that had just spoken to me was of this world or not didn't matter at all. It was that kind of voice. As if making no such distinction, simply believing trivially that both had equal worthlessness.
I was about to obey that voice. Somewhere in the depths of my consciousness, I wanted to mingle with the funeral procession following her, lose my consciousness, bury my individuality, and just blindly follow along.
However, the reality was that I was standing there with a dazed expression, watching the chilling procession pass before my eyes. At that moment, I saw tears flowing down her profile. No, those were not tears. Below her left eye, around her cheek, faintly glowing particles were welling up. They spilled out like water droplets carried by the wind, disappearing before hitting the ground. Following the trail of those particles, countless dead advanced in a band of light. It looked like a quiet river. I was captivated by it. I felt terribly frustrated at having no way to express my own emotions in the face of that scene.
When I came to my senses, the procession had gone, and soon the bustle of the downtown area returned. The strange atmosphere from moments ago was nowhere to be found. As if nothing had happened, people carrying the smell of alcohol crossed the road. In the distance, I could hear the hoarse voice of someone soliciting customers. The remnants of a dying night flowed slowly across the surface of the asphalt.
Having snapped back to reality, I stood rooted to the spot and touched my fingers just below my left eye. I had a feeling that I would meet that person again somewhere.
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