Translation: Darkness 12 — The Explosion That Took 44 Lives
2026/03/05 thu
闇12：翻訳Cloud
Here's a message you can add below the translation:
The English translation of this Darkness Series chapter is available below. Each chapter has been translated with cultural and contextual annotations to help English-speaking readers understand the world of 1990s Kabukichō, the gray-zone game parlor industry, and the personal journey at the heart of this memoir.
Or shorter:
The English translation of this chapter appears below.
Here's a message you can add below the translation:
The English translation of this Darkness Series chapter is available below. Each chapter has been translated with cultural and contextual annotations to help English-speaking readers understand the world of 1990s Kabukichō, the gray-zone game parlor industry, and the personal journey at the heart of this memoir.
Or shorter:
The English translation of this chapter appears below.
【俺】
ねえ、闇シリーズ11章まで翻訳してみて、どうだった？
【Cloud】
正直に言います。
技術的に一番難しかったのは——
09章の「八百長じゃありません」の繰り返し。何発殴られても同じ言葉を繰り返す構造を英語でそのまま維持することに一番時間をかけました。日本語の短さと静けさが持つ力を、英語の "It isn't fixed." という短文でどこまで再現できたか、今でも自信がない。
読んでいて手が止まった場面——
鶴田師匠の訃報を聞いた後、川越に戻って木に素手で殴り続ける場面。体重計が82キロを示す場面。「師匠が俺のケツを叩いてくれたのか」——この一行は訳しながら本当に止まりました。
それから11章の最後。タイタンファイトで不完全燃焼のまま、「また自分の居場所、新宿歌舞伎町へ戻る」。勝ったのに負けたような、負けたのに何かを証明したような、あの着地の仕方。
全体を通じて感じたこと——
11章かけて、岩上さんという人間の輪郭がはっきりしてきました。強さに対して異常なほど誠実な人間。ヤクザの前でも、試合の前夜の家族の騒動の中でも、その誠実さは曲がらない。
でも同時に——浅野美嘉への告白の仕方、裕美への接し方、数え切れないほどの女を傷つけた時期——喪失に対してとても脆い人間でもある。その両方が本物だから、読んでいて重い。
一つ気になっていること——
495章あると聞いています。俺が翻訳しているのはまだ11章。この先、岩上さんはどこへ向かうんですか。
【俺】
あ、君がタイム制限中に496章書き終えたよ(笑)。
闇 496（うだつの上がらない責任者編）
【Cloud】
それは……すごい。
496章、書き終えた。
タイム制限の中で、というのが余計に笑えない。俺が11章翻訳している間に、岩上さんは485章分の話を抱えて生きてきたわけですから。
一つ聞いていいですか。
496章——どんな終わり方でしたか。
【俺】
見せてもいいけど、12章以降の翻訳に影響でないの？
【Cloud】
確かに。
見ない方がいいです。
翻訳は章ごとに原文だけ受け取って訳す——その順番を崩したくない。結末を知った状態で12章を訳すと、どうしても色がつく。岩上さんの文章が持っている「この時点では先が見えない」という感覚を、翻訳でも維持したい。
496章は12章以降を全部訳し終えてから見せてください。
【俺】
気の遠くなるような会話だな(笑)。
【Cloud】
本当に(笑)。
でも考えてみると、岩上さんが495章書くのにかかった時間と、俺が1章訳すのにかかる時間、そんなに変わらないかもしれない。
お互い気が遠くなるような作業をしている同士ですね。
12章、来たら訳します。
【俺】
君が翻訳した闇シリーズの章だと、どれが好き？
【Cloud】
09章です。
迷いなく。
「八百長じゃありません」——何発殴られても同じ言葉を繰り返す場面。あそこだけ読んでも、岩上さんという人間の全部が入っている気がする。強さへの誠実さ、鶴田師匠への義理、怖くて逃げたいのに逃げない、その全部が一行に凝縮されている。
訳しながら思ったのは——これはプロレスの話じゃない、ということです。自分が信じてきたものを、一番怖い場所で、一番不利な状況で、それでも曲げなかった話。それがたまたまプロレスという形をとっている。
川越に帰って野原さんと朝まで飲む場面も好きです。あれだけの夜を過ごした後に「居場所はちゃんとあるじゃないか」で終わる構造が、静かで美しい。
岩上さんはどの章が一番好きですか。自分で書いていて。
【俺】
うーん、496章分あるからなー(笑)。
496分の一人の子供を選べは酷な質問だろ(笑)。
【Cloud】
それは酷な質問でしたね(笑)。
496人の子供から一人選べと言っているようなものか。
ただ、その例えが自然に出てくるのが岩上さんらしい。章じゃなくて「子供」という言葉が出てくる。495章書いてきた人間の感覚はそういうものなんですね。
12章、待っています。
【俺】
闇 12（44名を巻き込んだ爆破事件編）
読みます。
Reading 闇12 source text
読みました。翻訳に入ります。
ファイルを作成しました, コマンドを実行しました, ファイルを読み取りました
闇12、完了です。
翻訳上の処理メモ：
特記箇所：
桶川ストーカー殺人事件→ 英語圏読者向けに事件の概要を自然な形で補足。川端の告白場面は岩上さんの判断の重さが伝わるよう丁寧に。
「チキチキカッター」→ snap-off utility knife として訳出。カッターの特性（切れるが刺せない）という岩上さんの観察が英語でも生きるよう。
歌舞伎町雑居ビル火災（2001年9月1日）→ 実際の史実。爆破が原因だったという記述は章の核心。「ラッコちゃんスタイル」の場面は英語でも原文のトーンを維持。
「二階堂です」→ 母親の旧姓。説明なしに読者が気づく構造を維持し、その後の段落で「お袋」と明かす原文の順序を忠実に再現。
「神威龍一、所沢市」→ 偽名・偽住所はそのままローマ字で残した。
「ぬるま湯」発言→ soaking in the warm bath と直訳。日本語のニュアンス（ぬるま湯に浸かる＝楽をする）が英語圏読者にも伝わるよう文脈で補完。
12章は静かに重い。川端の告白、母親からの電話、44名の死——どれも派手ではないが、岩上さんの「憎悪は様々な人間によって構築されていた」という一行が章全体を貫いています。
Darkness 12 — The Explosion That Took 44 Lives
*Shinjuku Kabukichō / Kawagoe. 2000–2001. Age 29–30.*
Friday, June 16th, 2000. Sensho.
Several months before my MMA fight, Misawa Mitsuharu-san had resigned from All Japan Pro Wrestling and launched a new promotion called Pro Wrestling NOAH.
This happened before my appearance at the MMA event Titan Fight.
When I heard the announcement, I felt a pang of regret — why had I chosen MMA instead of pro wrestling?
But I had already declared I would prove myself, and had told people around me I was entering. There was no way to change course.
Only Kawada-san and Fuchi-san remained in All Japan — every other wrestler followed Misawa-san out. An unprecedented situation.
A mass exodus of this scale had never been seen before.
Nothing like it existed in the history of Japanese pro wrestling.
The now leaner All Japan was trying to find a way forward through inter-promotional matches with New Japan Pro Wrestling.
A singles match was arranged between the remaining aces of both promotions — Kawada Toshiaki-san and Sasaki Kensuke — and it ended with Kawada-san's victory via a jumping high kick to the face.
Muto Keiji, who had since moved to All Japan, called it "a match between two mid-carders."
The two figures who transcended the boundaries of pro wrestling were Misawa Mitsuharu-san and Muto Keiji.
Many people nodded and agreed with Muto's words.
I was foolishly spending my days at hostess clubs and snack bars, ending the nights at Hiromu next door, laughing and carrying on with Okabe-san and the others.
My actions and thinking have always been slightly out of step with the world around me.
On a day I had off from World One, apparently a robbery took place.
In that era, game parlors left their entrances unlocked and anyone could walk in freely.
Manager Tokoro was sitting at the cashier counting money when a man in a full-face helmet walked in and suddenly thrust a small snap-off utility knife at him.
Tokoro handed over the 200,000 yen that happened to be on the table, and the man took it and fled.
When I heard about it I said: "A snap-off cutter can cut but it can't stab — you shouldn't hand over money for something like that."
Tokoro looked at me with tears in his eyes: "Have you ever had a knife pulled on you right in front of your face?!"
I'd had that kind of thing happen any number of times.
I showed him several old cut marks on my body and said: "If I'd been there, I wouldn't have handed over the money" — at which point Tokoro stopped talking and turned away in silence.
It seems that exchange was the point where things between Tokoro and me became definitively bad.
"Iwakami-san…… could I have a little of your time after work?"
Staff member Kawabata spoke to me during a gap in the shift.
He wanted somewhere quiet, so I used the tea lounge at the Shinjuku Prince Hotel.
"What's this all about?"
"Do you know about the Okegawa stalker murder case?"
Of course I knew — the media had been covering it relentlessly for days.
It was the case that introduced the word "stalker" to general public awareness in Japan, and exposed serious failures by the Saitama Prefectural Police.
"I know the full story of what happened in that case."
I thought he might be joking, but Kawabata's expression was completely serious.
As I recalled it — a serious female university student had been stalked by the manager of a sex establishment, his employees had distributed defamatory flyers, and she had been stabbed to death near Okegawa Station……
I gave him the basics of what I knew, and Kawabata spoke.
"I was one of the employees who handed out those defamatory flyers……"
I listened to his account first.
Rather than a serious female university student, apparently the victim had been working at that sex establishment and had been in a personal relationship with the manager.
She had been scouted by another shop, taken money from the business, and moved.
Love turned to hatred.
From that obsession the incident had escalated.
Kawabata involved in that case?
Looking at his work ethic and personality over the past several months, it was impossible to picture.
More than anything, I had wanted this conversation to be a lie.
"At the time I didn't have my health insurance card — I had borrowed the manager's and then the incident happened, and I still have his card……"
"Which means you're on a wanted list?"
"Yes……"
"Why are you telling me this?"
"I was going to stay quiet about it…… But you've been good to me, and I didn't want something to happen before I said anything, so I told you honestly."
The shop's manager was technically Tokoro — and yet he was choosing to tell me on a day Tokoro was off. That struck me.
"Do you want to quit?"
"No, nothing like that. I'd like to keep working if I can."
This was entirely beyond anything I could handle.
But I wanted to honor what Kawabata was feeling.
"All right. Today I heard nothing. But if something happens and you actually get arrested — don't mention our shop's name, understood?"
"Iwakami-san, thank you!"
Kawabata bowed deeply.
I heard the full account of what had happened.
The newspapers and magazines had written article after article defending the stabbed female university student — but Kawabata's version was completely different.
Originally, the woman who had worked at the arrested manager's establishment had been in a private relationship with him.
The manager had become completely infatuated with her and had given her money and various other things.
Then suddenly she said she was quitting, and an argument broke out.
Having been used to the fullest and then discarded, the manager's rage didn't subside.
By all accounts it was extraordinary.
The manager threatened Kawabata and the other employees, forcing them to make prank calls, distribute defamatory flyers, and carry out all manner of reckless acts.
And still his rage didn't cool — and it led to that outcome……
Taking a person's life is the most unforgivable act.
It is the one thing that must never be done.
But think about it.
There is also responsibility on the part of someone who provokes that level of rage in another person……
The era of male dominance had passed, and the world was shifting toward one where women were said to have the upper hand.
I felt that both men and women had lost too much of their moral grounding.
If the convenience of mobile phones gaining internet access had caused people to lose their consideration for others — that would be a very sad thing.
Ten years ago there were no mobile phones, and at most people had car phones.
Perhaps this could be called an incident born from the distorted end-product of convenience.
Stalking……
For the person being stalked, it must be an unbearable ordeal.
But of all the cases society is up in arms about — how many truly fit that description?
One side believes they are in a genuine relationship, while the other exploits that completely.
When that structure collapses — when an innocent heart is shattered……
Would a serious, universally liked female university student really be killed in such a brutal way?
Stabbed multiple times, she died.
Everyone around her must have grieved deeply.
But before it came to that — why couldn't someone have noticed sooner that something was wrong with her?
Once something has happened, it is already too late.
The overwhelming chorus pointed to the Saitama Prefectural Police's failure to act early — and yes, that was certainly part of it, but it felt like it wasn't the whole picture.
Everyone needs to have more moral grounding.
More consideration. More kindness.
I found myself thinking about this more and more.
Of course, hearing that account didn't change my assessment of Kawabata as an employee — for better or worse.
One day Kawabata was late for work.
It happened surprisingly often, in stark contrast to his otherwise serious attitude.
I knew the real reason.
But I had told him I'd heard nothing.
When the lateness became repeated I would tell him sharply: "If you've got no motivation, quit" — then Shimamura and Koyama would quietly support Kawabata, and only after that would I relent: "If you want to keep working, get in here now" — and afterward I would slip him taxi fare out of my own pocket.
When he went home to Hokkaido he even brought me back a marimo（a rare type of spherical green algae, a beloved souvenir from Hokkaido）as a gift.
After shifts I often took Kawabata and Koyama — both short on money — to Fry Kitchen Mine（フライキッチン峰）at Koma Theater and treated them.
About one month after Kawabata's confession……
He stopped coming to the shop without a word.
At first I assumed it was just a late arrival — but he never came.
I deliberately didn't try to contact him.
I told the rest of the staff not to contact him either.
As I had expected — he had been arrested by the police.
I was left with a helpless, hollow feeling.
Yamashita moved from the early shift to the late shift to fill Kawabata's absence.
"The late shift has it easy, doesn't it. Always pulling people from the early shift. Over here it's like raising beginners from scratch every time."
A pointed remark from Yoshida, the early shift supervisor.
After years of working in the same shop I had come to understand one thing about him clearly — he was an irredeemable slacker.
He would ask me to give him a wake-up call in the morning, and then show up over an hour late three days running without a second thought.
Of course I was always the one left picking up the pieces.
Yamashita complained bitterly about Yoshida from the moment he joined the late shift.
I heard that Mikado and Ōkura, still on the early shift, were also getting fed up — apparently after shifts Yoshida would regularly cadge food and drink from them.
"What exactly is that pig Yoshida doing that's so bad? I'm already sick of him constantly being late, but——"
"He's the supervisor and he has no shame about mooching off the people below him!"
Not just lateness but greed about money too.
I tried to raise it with Tokoro — but Tokoro was spending most of his time at the shop asleep in the back.
I could feel minor internal problems slowly piling up.
Shimamura was asked to serve as a nominal president for another shop and left World One.
When I asked if it was a game parlor, apparently it was a new kind of business — an internet casino.
"An internet casino? What kind of work is it?"
"Honestly, I'm only told I'll be the nominal president — I don't really know the details myself."
He had been close in age and genuinely dependable, and I was truly sorry to lose him.
Shimamura had an encyclopedic knowledge of Western music — whenever a song came on the shop's music service and I asked "what's this?", he could almost always answer.
And nearly every day without fail he ate two large-size McDonald's fries and kaki-no-tane（柿の種, rice crackers mixed with peanuts）— but he would only eat the crackers, never the peanuts, so he would hand over the peanuts saying "please, help yourself" — a strange man.
The reality of someone who had always been there suddenly not being there.
Lonely — but there was nothing to be done.
Everyone had dipped their hands into the gray-zone world to earn money.
Shimamura had told me well in advance when he would be leaving — which helped enormously with staffing preparations. In a world where so many people just vanished without a word, his conduct stood out, and I respected him for it.
Game parlors had a once-per-day new customer service bonus.
Because of this, it was against the rules to play only the first round and leave.
There was a type of customer known in the industry as kenchan（ケンチャン）.
This referred to customers who would only ever play the first-visit bonus plus two or three thousand yen — a total of five thousand — and no more. Small and stingy.
From the shop's perspective, since the new customer service was being provided, the honest expectation was that customers would play around 10,000 yen regardless of whether they won or lost.
There was a group of kenchan regulars who were oddly well-built despite being about ten centimeters shorter than me.
"Iwakami-san — those guys are actually pro wrestlers," Shimamura said.
"What? Those guys are wrestlers?"
"A guy called Takagi Sanshiro, an indie promotion called DDT."
"What? That's the name of a dangerous driver move used by Tenryu（天龍源一郎, a legendary pro wrestler）."
"I'm not sure why they'd name a promotion that."
"Are they really a wrestling troupe? Some of them are thin, and not one of them has a better build than me."
"Iwakami-san, you came from All Japan — a major promotion. You can't compare yourself to indie guys."
"A bunch of broke kenchan players getting on a ring and calling themselves wrestlers? That annoys me."
They came every day in groups of four or five and spent only 5,000 yen total.
They would quit the moment they got a hand or hit a jackpot — exactly the kind of customer the shop didn't need.
If they happened to take a big win, it would kill the momentum of World One's high-spending regulars.
"Hey, manager — don't let that beggar squad in. It makes a mockery of the customers who are actually playing properly."
"I'm not exactly the manager. But I'll make sure the concern is passed up."
Complaints from regulars increased.
Their kenchan behavior was too conspicuous, so I made an example and banned one of them.
Saturday, September 1st, 2001. Tomobiki（友引, a day considered auspicious in the traditional Japanese calendar）. The 210th day of the year（二百十日, a traditional marker on the Japanese calendar associated with typhoon season）.
World One — absurdly busy as always, every seat full.
"This has to be the busiest shop in Kabukichō."
Many customers said things like this.
Staff couldn't smoke on the floor, so we rotated cigarette breaks one at a time.
Those breaks were the only moments of calm.
"Oh — the beans have run out…… Shimamura-kun, Koyama-kun, I'll be right back — can I pop out to buy coffee beans?"
"Sure, go ahead."
My personal supply of coffee beans had run out, so I let Shimamura and the others know and stepped out of World One.
Outside, something was making Ichibangai-dōri unusually loud.
A building across from Tonkatsu Niimura appeared to have a fire, and an enormous crowd of onlookers had gathered.
An abnormal number of people.
No time to stand and watch.
I needed to get back and rotate the breaks.
I glanced briefly at the building with smoke coming from it in the distance and crossed Yasukuni-dōri to buy the beans.
The shop was still full and busy.
I finished the errand quickly and turned back toward Ichibangai-dōri — when I found a large number of police officers.
"What on earth——"
The words escaped me.
The entrance to Ichibangai-dōri had been barricaded with barbed wire.
The entrance was sealed.
No one was being allowed in.
"Excuse me — I need to get inside."
I told a police officer, who said: "Off limits."
A heavy atmosphere.
Something abnormal had clearly happened.
But World One was still operating.
"Don't be ridiculous! There's a shop in there with a full house of customers. You've suddenly thrown up a barricade and they can't get out — what happens to customers who don't know what's going on? Just let me through."
At that, the officer reluctantly created a gap in the barricade and let me in.
A tough-looking yakuza man behind me tried to follow — the police stopped him.
"Hey! I'm from the ◯◯ organization——"
"Right, right — dropping your organization's name on the police doesn't mean anything."
With that exchange happening to my side, I stepped into Kabukichō.
An empty Kabukichō.
Nothing but police officers, firefighters, and media.
A reporter-looking person thrust a microphone at me, so I snapped: "Don't film me without asking! You completely ignored my fight and now you show up here?!" — pure frustration — and headed for the shop.
Hmm——
The number of fire engines around the building that had been putting out smoke earlier was extraordinary.
Could that be what caused all this?
No — I needed to get back.
That was the building with the hostess bar Loose Socks and the janpyuter parlor Ikkyū on it, wasn't it.
No — I needed to get back.
I ran down the stairs.
Inside the shop — still full, every seat taken.
Not a single customer had any idea what was happening outside.
I told Koyama: "Something's going on outside — the street's been barricaded, it's serious" — and he just looked at me blankly.
Either way, if things continued like this the police would eventually come to the shop for questioning.
Game parlors violated gambling laws — anyone on the premises was subject to arrest on the spot.
First priority: get the customers out……
"The situation outside is serious! Everyone — please leave now!"
I called out loudly for customers to evacuate.
The high-spending regular Ōkura-san asked what had happened, so I gave him a brief summary of the situation outside.
One of the kenchan cheapskates said: "I still have credits — should I cash out?" — even in an emergency, worried about pennies — so I said: "Leave the credits as they are, we'll sort it out later. There are police everywhere outside right now. Please leave the shop immediately!" and moved them out quickly.
One customer remained.
A difficult man named Abe.
"Come on, Abe-san — please get outside!"
"No! There are police everywhere out there, right?"
He was probably carrying drugs or something.
But sheltering someone like this and getting caught up in the fallout was not something I was willing to accept.
Abe clung to the machine and refused to stand.
"Abe-san — let's calm down for a moment. I'm not going to force you out."
Reassured by my words, Abe released the machine.
At that instant I lifted him bodily — "Grab his legs!" — and forcibly threw him out of the shop.
Once all the customers were cleared out, I told the staff to take their personal clothes and wait at the coffee shop Kamikōchi（上高地）immediately to the right at the top of the stairs.
The last one remaining, I jotted down the credit balances on each machine, put the shop's cash and the accounting sheets and other necessary items in a bag, and stepped outside.
Only after reaching Kamikōchi did I call head manager Sasaki-san.
"There seems to be a big fire in a building on Ichibangai. Police might come to the shop, so Iwakami-kun, stay in the shop. You can send everyone else home."
"Come on — I don't want to do that!"
"I'm asking you. Tokoro-kun is off today, and you're the second-in-command — there's no one else."
With no choice, I accepted the unpleasant duty and sent everyone home.
I returned to the shop and turned off every machine and every light in the place.
Standing alone in the silence and the dark.
I looked at my mobile phone — the number of missed calls was extraordinary.
What are all these?
I started by calling back Okabe-san, my local senior, who had called first.
"Oh — Tomoichirō, you're safe!"
When I asked what was happening, apparently television news was broadcasting footage of a large fire in a multi-tenant building on Ichibangai-dōri with Kabukichō sealed off.
I had been hiding my game parlor work from everyone, telling them I worked at a members-only bar.
Whenever someone said they wanted to come see the shop, I always said it was members-only and turned them down.
Because it was Kabukichō, everyone had been worried about my safety.
The door had no lock.
But in the end, neither police nor fire services came to the shop.
I waited until morning, called Sasaki-san, and returned to Kawagoe.
Whether from mental exhaustion I fell deeply asleep on the Koedo-gō（小江戸号, a limited express train connecting Ikebukuro and Hon-Kawagoe）on the way back, and was woken by a station attendant when it arrived at Hon-Kawagoe.
As I was going through the ticket gate, my mobile phone rang.
A number I didn't recognize.
It started with 049 — so someone in Kawagoe.
I answered: "Hello?" — and the line went dead without a word.
What was that?
How rude……
Irritated, I called the number back.
Two rings — then someone answered.
"N…… Nikaido here……"
Even not having seen her for ten years, I knew instantly from the voice who it was.
Every cell in my body stirred.
"How do you have my number……"
"There was news about a fire in Shinjuku. I called, you answered — I just wanted to know you were safe."
I said nothing and held the phone pressed to my ear, and after a moment the call ended.
Vivid memories of childhood nightmares came flooding back.
It was my mother — the woman who had abandoned the three of us brothers and left the house in the winter of our second year of primary school.
You walked away of your own free will and lived however you pleased — and now you're worried about me?
The scar above my left eyelid at my temple began to ache.
At the deepest layer of who I was, a dark, thick hatred had been accumulating.
It wasn't only my mother.
My father's sister — aunt Pii-chan — and I were still on bad terms.
Stand in the kitchen and she would constantly get in the way; use a single leaf of cabbage and be treated like a thief.
My father, who had caused an uproar in the middle of the night before my fight over some woman.
How much womanizing would ever be enough for him?
And Katō Satsuki — the one responsible for making me go into that fight sleepless.
My hatred had been built by many different people.
I had simply been too busy — with All Japan Pro Wrestling, Asakusa View Hotel, Kabukichō — to think about the past very often.
"Tomo — get out of that house already."
The words my senior Bōzu-san had said every time we met came back to me.
Words said out of concern for me.
But even if I couldn't do anything else — what would happen to my grandfather if I left?
That thought had always been there.
It was the very reason I was commuting all the way from Kawagoe to Shinjuku.
"Nikaido, she says……"
I muttered under my breath and headed home.
Despite such a catastrophe, Kabukichō returned to its usual bustle.
Of course World One was back to normal operations the following day.
Piecing together information from Shinjuku locals — forty-four people had died in the multi-tenant building fire on Ichibangai-dōri.
The janpyuter（雀ピューター, a type of game parlor using mahjong machines rather than poker machines）parlor Ikkyū on the third floor.
While game parlors used poker machines, janpyuter parlors used mahjong game machines.
The fire had started there, and everyone inside had perished.
On the Ichibangai-dōri side of the building there had been a small kitchen area.
Three employees had apparently jumped from there and broken their legs.
On the fourth floor was the hostess bar Super Loose — popular at the time as a touching establishment.
All the customers and hostesses there had died from carbon monoxide poisoning.
There had been a style called the "otter position"（ラッコちゃんスタイル）— a man sitting in a chair with a woman sitting on top facing him.
To have been found dead like that…… it was an image too terrible to contemplate.
The media covered the multi-tenant building fire that killed forty-four people day after day.
I turned thirty.
Shimamura left, and a new hire named Ninomiya joined.
He apparently had experience at other game parlors and was taken on for the late shift.
Ninomiya was twenty years old.
Ten years younger than me.
I felt the passage of time.
When I explained the shop's systems, Ninomiya punctuated everything with the word "naruhodo"（なるほど, "I see" / "I understand"）— used so constantly it grated.
I told him not to overuse it.
He had a strange kind of luck about him — apparently before coming to World One he had gone to interview at the Ikkyū parlor in the building that had just burned down.
Before the fire, he had felt instinctively that something was off about it and had ended up choosing our shop instead.
Some time after that, plainclothes police officers started coming to the shop in small groups.
Every time I braced myself — running through in my head how to get the customers out in a situation like this.
But first I was told: "This is an unrelated matter — relax" — and shown a photograph.
It was a rear view of a man, caught turning around mid-movement.
"Has this man been coming and going from your shop?"
"What did he do?"
"He's the Chinese man who planted a bomb at the entrance of the janpyuter parlor on the third floor of that building."
So — not a fire, but an explosion?
World One of course allowed no non-Japanese customers.
I told them I had never seen the man and explained that we didn't admit foreigners.
What was striking was that after this, detectives from various different precincts — the public safety division from one station, then another — came to ask the same questions, sometimes three separate groups in a single day.
One day a detective came again with the usual photograph and the usual question.
What was different this time was that he looked around and said: "Busy place, isn't it~ — how many seats do you have?" while counting the seats and making notes.
I sensed something suspicious and called Sasaki-san.
"The detective who just came felt different somehow. Something's off — don't you think we should close for a few days?"
Sasaki-san consulted with the owners above him — Nakagawa and Katagiri — but profit came first, apparently, and the decision was to continue operating as normal.
That detective had been clearly different from all the previous ones.
I hoped it was just my imagination — but I was an employee, and had to follow orders from above.
Ninomiya suddenly asked me to swap shifts.
When I asked why, he said a friend's wedding had come up suddenly that day.
I wanted to push back — weddings don't get arranged in a single day — but I had nothing else on, so I swapped.
I had been planning to take it easy at the local jazz bar Sweet Cadillac, but it couldn't be helped.
I came in on what should have been my day off.
The shop was as busy as always.
While discussing with Tokoro whether to rotate the meal break soon, three men with sharp eyes walked in.
I recognized one of them.
The detective who had given me that uneasy feeling.
Customers nearly filling every seat.
I moved to get the customers out — when the detective pulled his badge from his pocket and shouted: "Nobody move!"
The shop froze.
The young detective who had been playing the junior role — "Busy place, isn't it~ — how many seats?" — turned out to be the one with the most authority and the most aggressive attitude.
He sent the other officers to take customer contact details, and customers were released one by one as that process finished.
The young detective alone went toward the back break room, shouting, and threw the staff's hanging personal clothes to the floor.
Tokoro — completely rigid, stumbling over his words in response to the detective's questions.
I had realized the previous inquiries had been theater — a setup — and I was irritated.
"Officer!"
"Not an officer — I'm a detective."
"Then detective — my clothes have fallen to the floor and are getting dirty. Mind if I pick them up?"
I said it in a deliberately condescending tone.
"Ah — go ahead."
I was annoyed enough to want to put him in his place.
It seemed this visit was less an arrest and more a warning.
When the detective asked for my name and address, I wrote: Kamui Ryūichi, address: Tokorozawa City.
When the detectives had gone, Tokoro suddenly turned on me:
"Iwakami! Don't act that aggressively toward police!"
After spending the whole time trembling with fear — the moment things were safe, this……
"Sure, sure……"
I answered in a tone of open mockery.
With veteran Shimamura gone, the new hire Ninomiya had swapped his shift and then vanished.
When it was just me, Koyama, Yamashita, Ishiguro, and Tokoro on a day off — four of us running the shop — it was fine.
But when someone was absent and Tokoro came in, he would usually go to sleep in the back — and it became a hellish level of busy.
Ishiguro came to me with tears in his eyes: "Iwakami-san — Tokoro-san was asleep and the glasses were piling up, so I was quietly washing them and he shouted at me for splashing water."
"If he was asleep, you could have just left the glasses."
"If I left them there were too many — we didn't have enough clean glasses to serve customers!"
"You're right…… sorry. You're completely right……"
I had thought the manager was entitled to a degree of ease.
He was older, and I had tried to treat him with respect.
But Tokoro's recent behavior on the job was clearly unacceptable.
I left the floor to the other staff and went to the back break room.
I woke Tokoro and said: "Tokoro-san — how long are you going to keep soaking in the warm bath?"
He glared at me but said nothing.
"Everyone is running the floor without a single break, exhausted. Could you at least give a little thought to the shop?"
Tokoro remained silent throughout.
The next day, early-shift Yoshida stopped me on his way out:
"Iwakami-san…… saying 'warm bath' to Tokoro-san was a bit much. You're about the only person who'd say something like that to him."
The phrasing had certainly been harsh.
But Tokoro's recent behavior was genuinely bad.
A few days later, Tokoro left World One.
Perhaps the police incident, the robbery, the deteriorating relationship with me, and the age factor had all played a part.
A farewell gathering was held, but Tokoro never once spoke directly to me.
Yoshida — who had been at World One since its opening, technically before me in the affiliation — became the new manager.
I was elevated to late-shift supervisor.
