Nocturnal University - "Entrance Ceremony" -
Greetings from President Shirai Neko
“A starry night, the red eyes of a cat walking through the darkness”
- To all of you who find light with cat eyes in a world of darkness, this is the meeting place -
Welcome, everyone.
In this dark world, where you can see neither your feet nor the future,
thank you for gathering here.
I am Shirai Neko, President of Nocturnal University.
Yes. My name is Shirai, and my name is "Neko" (Cat), but, uh... I am a human.
I exist as a human with cat eyes. Nice to meet you.
My hobby is haiku.
Yes, the "Nocturnal University" has suddenly begun, and this is the entrance ceremony... so I will introduce this university again.
This "Nocturnal University" was started as a gathering place for all you "cat-eyed" people who won't be defeated by the darkness, to "find light in a dark world and discover the path to the future"!
Clap, clap, clap... (clapping alone)
Right now, I am the only president, but I'm sure there are students out there in this pitch-black world who are listening to this story while shining their cat eyes. I wonder if they will appear. For now, I can't see them, though...
In the generally crumbling world of darkness,
when people think of a university, there are still many cases where there is a school building first, and professors, and so on,
but for now, this one
has no school building.
There are no professors or teachers. For now, it's just President Shirai, all alone.
I can't see the students yet.
So, for now, it's pitch black in terms of visuals...
But, but... from here, I would like to borrow the hearts and minds of you cat-eyed students,
and build it up in everyone's imagination. How innovative!
Someday, when requests from everyone start to gather,
I hope we can have a place where we can actually meet in reality, like a school building.
Because, aren't there many buildings in this dark world where they built the building first without thinking about the contents? What was it? "Building a Buddha statue without putting in the soul?" Uh... isn't the soul important?
So, soul first.
I would be happy if you all could keep an image in your head or heart of what kind of shape would be good for a "university that rises in the darkness" and a "university for us all to welcome the morning there"... or something like that.
Yes, that's it. University overview finished.
Um, today, another thing I want to talk about is the background of how this university was created.
Why did I, Shirai, suddenly start this all by myself?
You know, don't you feel like time is flowing towards us from the future??
What? Is it just me, the cat??
I feel like I'm meeting up with someone at a point a little bit ahead. With students who have the same cat eyes as the president.
It just so happened that this cat was the first one to notice that meeting.
But once you notice it, it's like the organizing starts.
No, you don't have to take on the role of organizer. But, I thought it might be fun.
Gathering fellow cat-eyed people. There's Shirai, Kuroi-san, Akai-san, Aoi-san, Momoi-san, Fujii-san...
Everyone's given name is "Neko"... That sounds fun.
Then, don't we need a place for everyone to gather...?
For now, I've decided that this is the meeting place for our consciousness, and I'm starting "Nocturnal University" with words.
Then, something will move, and more people will notice the meeting, or something like that.
If you move even a little bit, the ripples will spread and reach someone... that's possible.
Because, as the president, one day, suddenly, when I realized it...
I was thinking, "Oh, I'm going to build a university that conveys 'midnight education'."
It even came with a bonus hot tagline, "Nocturnal University - To live for the coming dawn! -"
I wondered, "No, whose words are these...?" At first, anyway.
But, you all have that too, right? No? If you're cat-eyed, you have it, right? Haha.
Ideas or images that you don't know whose they are or where they came from.
By the time you notice, they are already "positioned" inside you. Like that.
And the ideas and images grow rapidly, and finally, you have no choice but to move! Like that.
It's like being pushed forward by a big invisible wind, or sometimes being kicked in the butt by a gust of wind... It's what you call being driven.
President Shirai here, I've been thinking...
There is this thing called the "realm of human unconsciousness," right?
Compared to the realm we can consciously perceive with our minds,
there are things like "just somehow," "I don't know the reason, but," or "it just feels like."
Even if we can't explain it, in the end, our decisions are made by this unconscious realm.
This must exist in a deeper layer than the realm where we think with our heads,
and doesn't it seem like that deep layer is "all connected"?
Like, from the ends scattered by the Big Bang, it's a position that has returned a bit toward the center.
Even if we usually live with our scattered surface consciousness, when we happen to connect with that slightly deeper unconsciousness,
various things like the "voices of everyone" that exist there flow in,
and a "flash of inspiration" about "something fun for everyone, not just for myself" reaches me as a voiceless voice,
that's what it is.
In ten years, I hope that in physics, chemistry, medicine, and many other fields,
this whole area will be fully elucidated...
Anyway, since this project to "create a meeting place for something fun for everyone" flowed from this "all-connected space," I was moved to act, and...
as I spun words in my own way as President Shirai and took action, the result was this "Nocturnal University."
Yes, that was the background of the university's founding.
Now, the "Nocturnal University" begins, but for now, I, President Shirai, have nothing to do but talk alone...
I'll be unfolding a "Lecture of Darkness" while I wait... so, let's start the lecture!
Here is the Nocturnal University curriculum! Ta-da!
First Night: Super-Economics
Second Night: Super-Life and Death Studies
Third Night: Super-Happiness Studies
Fourth Night: Super-Physics
Fifth Night: Super-Conflict, Violence, and War
I plan to hold solo lectures according to this schedule. Clap clap clap (clapping alone).
Well then, once again, I think I'll declare the opening of the Nocturnal University.
To you, my fellow "cat-eyed" ones, just like me, Shirai,
to you who live in this dark world with "nocturnal eyes."
When the "darkness" called "despair" is born,
the "light" is born at the same time. Can you see it now?
It's okay if you can't. You will definitely meet it at the meeting place for cat-eyed ones ahead.
Are you living quietly now, looking toward a brand new morning that continues into the darkness?
In the era from here on,
to live means to give shape to the light you saw in this darkness.
We cats, with our inherent jumping power, will run up through dimensions and make darkness and light one.
That is a world without "problems" or "solutions."
It should be a world where everything originally exists.
In the "all-connected unconscious realm," a tangible "Nocturnal University" has already been completed,
and there is a place there where you, who keep your eyes shining to shape a new path together, gather.
Yes. Well then, the entrance ceremony is now adjourned.
I, the cat, will move to the classroom and start the lecture immediately.
Subjects worthy of the title "Super" to transcend are appearing one after another.
There are as many subjects as there are despairs.
The first night is "Super-Economics."
↓ Classroom is here
illustration by NEKO Shiroi
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Neko Shirai
President of the "Nocturnal University".
Toward the next new morning, I am giving lectures alone in the dark night of the dark world.
The first installment of this classroom, which views the world through "cat's eyes" and sees light in the darkness, is "Super-Economics Theory".
It is a university that exists only in the reader's mind, but I am planning to give it form as "Midnight Educational TV".