Translation: Darkness 31 — Shinjuku Crescendo Arc

2026/07/27 mon
闇31：翻訳Claude

【Claude】

原文を送ってください。

【俺】

闇　31（新宿クレッシェンド編）

【Claude】

読みます。 読みました。翻訳に入ります。 翻訳完了です。 Darkness 31 — Shinjuku Crescendo Arc、翻訳完了。

処理メモ

小説内の小説（作中作） → イタリック体で区別。原文の「　」（全角スペースによる段落字下げ）は英語の段落構造に自然に変換。

「東スポ」 → Tōspo（訳注を末尾に追加。Tokyo Sports の略称として英語圏読者に補足）

「ヴァンパイアハンター」 → Vampire Hunter（訳注でDarkstalkers（北米名）に言及。原文の固有名詞を尊重しつつ英語圏読者への補足）

「モリガン／ダークネス・イルージョン」 → Morrigan / Darkness Illusion（英語版ゲームの正式名称と一致するためそのまま）

「グリルトーゴー」 → Grill Tōgō（ローマ字表記のみ）

「ゴリッチョ」 → Goriccho（ローマ字表記。愛称のニュアンスそのまま）

「ステーキ宮」 → Steak Miya（チェーン名のため英訳せず）

「大阪」 → Osaka（フィールドの従業員名。ニックネームか本名か不明だがそのままローマ字）

「原稿用紙三百枚」 → "three hundred manuscript pages"（日本の原稿用紙換算をそのまま英語で保持。注釈なし——文脈で量感は伝わる）

「正攻法ではなく亜流で」 → "Not by the direct path, but by a different angle"——原文のニュアンスを保持。

ヤクザ組織名 → XX-kai / XX Alliance（原文の●●と同様、伏せ字処理を維持）

Translation: Darkness 31 — Shinjuku Crescendo Arc

Darkness 31 — Shinjuku Crescendo Arc

Kabukichō, Shinjuku. Early 2000s.

JAZZ Bar Sweet Cadillac

The next day I brought my laptop to Melon, got the work setup done, and started writing a novel — no title yet, just started. I launched Word, checked the settings: forty characters across, forty lines down.

How to open it? I wanted something that started quietly, without drama.

Dealing with customers who came in to buy black-market videos, I threw myself into the writing during every gap.

The Japanese economy? Doesn't matter to me — recession, boom, whatever. It's all the same.

Nothing to do again today. I'm lying at home with the TV on. Some documentary — whether it was staged or not I couldn't say — was running a feature on Kabukichō. What a flashy city. I stare blankly at the screen. A city where the lights never go out, twenty-four hours a day. Shinjuku Kabukichō.

"Nothing to do with me……"

I mutter to myself and lie back on my futon. The air has gotten properly cold. December is almost here.

Unemployed, watching the little money I'd managed to save drain away day by day……

Can't stand my own situation anymore. When I close my eyes, yesterday comes back to me.

Not bad. A decent start.

I barely watch TV in real life, so the content is fabricated — but someone at the pachinko floor had mentioned a program like that was actually on, I vaguely remembered.

I want to create a protagonist with nothing going for him, completely hopeless.

While I'm at it — let's have him dumped by his girlfriend right at the start. The author himself got dumped by Harumi, after all……

That means a heroine needs to appear, but what's her name?

I thought of Nagai Izumi — the girl who'd rejected me in high school. I wonder if she's become a good woman by now. When did I last see her?

I was still in my mid-twenties…… working at a game parlor called Pro, less than a year into Kabukichō. I'd run into Izumi for the first time since high school graduation and taken her to the Asakusa View Hotel — that memory. First and last time I saw her, so a lot of time has passed.

All right — the heroine's name will be Izumi.

The protagonist: Akasaki Hayato, chosen for how easy the name is to type. The love interest: Izumi.

Since this is meant to be an introduction to Kabukichō, I need to tone everything down considerably — not write what actually happened. I'd like to work in the episode of being taken to the yakuza office by Naruto, but if I did, readers would think it was fiction even though it's real. It would read like something made up.

Realism matters. But that realism doesn't have to come from the Kabukichō side of things.

The scar on my left eyelid twinged for a moment. Right. I trace it slowly with my left index finger.

I thought back on part of the abuse I'd taken from my mother, and decided to give those memories to Akasaki, the protagonist. That helpless childhood. The vivid memory of when this scar was made. I just needed to project the fear as I'd seen it, through my own eyes.

Which brought me to the father. If I wrote about his way with women, I'd have to bring Kato Satsuki into it too. Writing it out that fully would be a mess — it would drag the story out. Better to just have him die in an accident.

Summary of the plot: unemployed and freshly dumped, Akasaki ends up in Shinjuku Kabukichō by a misunderstanding, and gets a job at a game parlor. A simple story.

I thought through several things that could serve as the core of the narrative. One: the backstory of abuse at his mother's hands.

What to do about the three brothers? No mother, father dead in an accident — and three siblings on top of that, it feels off-balance somehow.

It might be interesting to put in a character like Misaki, the girl I looked after like a little sister.

But I've never had a sister, so the domestic detail would ring false. Better then to go all the way: the protagonist accidentally causes his little sister's death in childhood. A setup like that shouldn't feel strange.

The abuse, and the loss of the sister. Both would be necessary to shape who Akasaki Hayato has become.

The sister is invented, the mother is real. Truth and fiction mixed together — that should give the work a sense of reality. A strange certainty I had about that.

Next comes Kabukichō, which means I need to explain the place in a way readers can follow.

First — what kind of character to make the manager? No, wait — before that, the question of why the protagonist ends up working in Shinjuku of all places needs to come first.

What brought me to this city back then. Simply that I had no money. But that wasn't all. Bōzu-san — a senior I'd been close to for years — was holding his wedding reception with Yūko-san. He'd even asked me to give the best man's speech, and I was genuinely panicking.

I couldn't even afford to put money in a congratulations envelope back then. Escaping reality, I'd gone to the Western restaurant Grill Tōgō near Kawagoe Station's west exit, and it was while reading the Tōspo* and eating a hamburger steak there that it happened.

A small-print ad that caught my eye. The words "twelve thousand yen a day" lured me, and that's how I ended up heading to Kabukichō.

In Kabukichō at the time, "café" meant a game parlor. I didn't even know that — I made my easygoing way to Shinjuku for the first time, and here I am now.

Naruto, the owner back then. He took a strange interest in me — a complete stranger — and that led to a fight to the death with someone I'd never met, and in the end he took me to a yakuza boss's office. He punched me in the face over and over insisting pro wrestling wasn't fixed.

I haven't seen him since I left Vega. Is he still in this city? With that bulldozing personality of his — he probably won't live long……

Anyway, I can cut all of that and just use the Tōgō scene with the Tōspo as enough reason to head for Shinjuku.

I finished work and shut the laptop. I was starving, so I called my old classmate Iwasaki Tsutomu.

"Hey, Goriccho. Just finished work, still in Shinjuku. I'll be in Kawagoe in about an hour — want to get food?" "Sure, where are we going?"

"Hmm…… how about Steak Miya for a change?" "Got it. I'll pick you up at the station in an hour."

Gori — Iwasaki Tsutomu

His nickname was Gori, or Goriccho.

I didn't often spend time with people from my hometown, but Gori and I had a strange ongoing connection — we'd meet irregularly, here and there. I took the Kōedo limited express on the Seibu-Shinjuku Line home.

I met up with Gori and we headed to Steak Miya.

"So what did you want to talk about?"

Gori, asking in that distinctive gravelly voice of his.

"Well…… I've been thinking of starting a novel." "I don't read anything with words in it, so I don't care."

"I'm not asking you to read it. I'm just telling you I've started something new." "Oh. Then put me in it."

Gori stabbed a piece of steak with his fork, grinning.

"By nickname? By real name?" "Hmm…… just my surname."

The protagonist's name is Akasaki Hayato. If I put in Iwasaki, the character 崎 appears twice right away……

I explained this, and Gori said "who cares about something that small" — insisting he had to appear as Iwasaki.

"What kind of role do you want?" "Hmm, a good boss figure for the protagonist."

This man is a genuine idiot. The protagonist is half-based on me. How exactly would someone like Gori end up as my superior?

If I wrote him with his actual personality, the story would definitely go off the rails. But he said he just wanted his name used — if that's all, it's a different matter.

The first manager I'd gotten to know in that city was Takahashi Hiroshi at Vega.

I thought back on how he'd done various things for me — though in Takahashi's case, he'd been skimming from the shop's cash and just threw a little my way. Still, I could just write Takahashi's behavior under Gori's name.

The story was taking shape in my head with a reasonable amount of natural momentum.

My state of mind the first time I went to Shinjuku Kabukichō. Since truth and fiction are being mixed, keeping the game parlor's name as Vega wouldn't do……

If this work ever reached the world and caught Naruto's eye, it would be trouble.

What to call the game parlor?

There was a female character in the fighting game Vampire Hunter* I'd been obsessed with years ago — Morrigan.

Morrigan.

Her special move was Darkness Illusion. Too long, but — Darkness? Yes — Darkness fit Kabukichō perfectly.

I decided to make Iwasaki the manager of a game parlor called "Darkness."

I slept, woke up, and went to work at Melon in Kabukichō. No customers come in at this early hour, so I opened the laptop and launched Word with enthusiasm.

Wait — nobody in the general public knows what a game parlor is. Even I didn't know "café" meant game parlor until I walked into one.

Everyone knows the rules of poker, but how do you explain in-store bingo?

I really should have taken photos of the place back then……

Game parlors are practically extinct in Kabukichō by now. While the image of those bingo games was still in my head, I'd try drawing it out.

I launched Photoshop and pulled some playing card images from the internet.

Game parlor interior — BINGO

But even if I drew it, I couldn't use a picture in a novel. Which means I'd have to explain it in text after all……

The section explaining the game parlor's system was the problem. An incredibly tedious thing to write.

Something I understood completely myself — I had to make readers understand it through words alone.

The two characters, Akasaki and Iwasaki. If I structured it as a dialogue between them, I could work the explanation in naturally.

Handling the occasional customer between stretches of writing, the novel crept forward.

I was deep in writing and thinking ahead to the next development when I heard footsteps on the stairs. Kitanaka.

"Hey — how are sales?" "Good work out there. About fifty thousand so far."

"Right. A little later, head over to the warehouse and let Noji-san go get a proper meal." "Understood."

Interrupting me right when I'm in the mood to write, you idiot……

I said it inside and shut the laptop. It's fine. If I'm at the warehouse, Noji will be gone for two hours. I can use that time to write. Even a short stretch — right now I wanted to be writing every minute I could.

In a normal job this would never be allowed, but the loose management of the shadow trade let it slide.

The warehouse smelled as bad as ever. No matter how many times I came, I would never get used to it.

Noji was in high spirits — his free time had arrived. A man who got this visibly delighted over two hours of rest a day, in a life like his — there was something pitiable about it.

"Well, I'm off to eat — I'll leave it to you." "Of course. Take your time."

"Oh — you haven't been bringing the piano lately. Did you give it up?" "Ah, the keyboard? No, I haven't given it up."

"I thought so — every time I'd come down the stairs toward Melon I'd hear a nice sound and think, that's something. So you haven't quit." "No. It's just that carrying it in every day is quite a job."

Explaining the whole story with the piano teacher and why I'd stopped going to lessons was too much trouble, so I gave him a vague excuse.

"True enough." "Go take your time with the meal."

"Thanks. By the way — Iwakami, do you have any days off at all?"

"None." "Not one, all year?"

"Yeah. You haven't been here six months yet, so you probably didn't know. Thing is — I have a wife and kid in the Philippines." "Really?"

The fact that a man like Noji was married. I hadn't expected it — I was genuinely surprised.

"No reason to lie about it."

"I…… suppose not." "I go to the Philippines once a year for about two weeks." "Just once a year?"

I found myself wondering what the point of being married was.

"Yeah…… used to be I'd go for a month, come back for a month, back and forth."

Noji murmured it with a look that was focused on something far away. This man had his own life, on his own terms.

If this was true, he must have been doing well financially at some point. Hard to picture, but……

"Anyway, I'm off to eat. Take care of things."

Noji, who'd been genuinely cold when I first arrived, had finally gotten used to me. Before, this kind of ordinary exchange would have been unthinkable. One of these days I'd like to sit down and have a drink with him, hear about his past.

Once Noji left the warehouse I threw the window wide open and scattered two bags of air freshener I'd bought myself into the corners of the room. That might clear the smell a little.

I put a flattened cardboard box on the table and set the laptop on top. That at least made a small improvement against the cockroaches.

Back to the novel. Right now I was filled with a desire to finish this work as fast as possible.

Hoping no delivery orders came in from Kitanaka, I started writing again.

I'd never imagined that putting words on a page could be this enjoyable. A different kind of enjoyment from piano. That's what writing had.

I could move characters I'd invented however I wanted, give them all kinds of thoughts and feelings. As I wrote, I tried to visualize the scenes as moving images in my head. I kept in mind that I wanted anyone reading my words to be able to form those same images on their own, without effort.

Roughly how many manuscript pages does a novel need to be? I'd read novels before, but I'd never paid attention to page count.

I thought about published novels I knew, tried to estimate by thickness. If I could get to three hundred manuscript pages, that should be at least enough for one book.

I knew nothing about literature.

Ignorant as I was, I had an entirely baseless confidence that if I put this burning drive into the writing, what came out wouldn't be lacking. No basis for it whatsoever.

A truly gripping novel — when you start reading, you stop noticing time passing. That was my experience as a reader. Finding a book like that had made me feel something close to happiness.

I wanted to make something that felt that way.

The other thing I needed to keep in mind as I wrote: readability.

I made sure to load the dialogue between characters as much as possible, keeping it natural. Background description — anything dull that wasn't strictly necessary — I cut out. Internal conflict and feeling, I put in close-up.

Let what the characters are thinking be the engine that drives the story forward.

Two hours in the warehouse. Three delivery runs came in during that time, but otherwise I was able to focus on writing.

Opening — the breakup scene

On the way home from work I stopped in at Sweet Cadillac, my usual place. I pulled out the laptop there too and kept writing.

The master was surprised that I'd suddenly started writing a novel, but I didn't care.

Next to me, Mizuno — a man I'd had a run-in with before — was muttering to himself at length about novels. This type never actually does anything themselves, but loves to talk at length about what other people do, in an authoritative tone.

Same with music. When I played Zanarkand, he'd praised it without reservation — the moment he found out it was from a game, he turned completely cold.

I didn't have time to waste on him. I drank my Glenlivet and kept writing.

After a straight pour of whisky, I followed it immediately with iced coffee as a chaser. The iced coffee here really is good.

I'd always wanted to bring Harumi to this jazz bar just once. Have her drink this iced coffee and smile when she said how good it was.

That million-dollar smile — I want to see it again. A wish that can't come true now……

If Harumi heard that I was writing a novel — what face would she make? If you'd be happy about it, I'd gladly offer this untitled work to you.

I thought back to our first date. I was genuinely happy then. The photo booth sticker we took on the way home — I still carry it with me, always.

Why won't she look at me……

No matter how much effort I put in, Harumi never turned around.

It was painful. And sad.

Just once is enough. Listen to my Zanarkand. And smile.

Have I ever loved one woman this much before?

There have been women I noticed in the past. Women I recognized as kind and realized I liked.

Each time I used money to be with women — many of them — that pure feeling got a little dirtier. Like the streets of Kabukichō. After a while, no matter what woman I met, all I wanted was to sleep with them. No woman I actually sought with something real inside me.

Why Harumi, of all people?

Yes — we went on a date the day before her birthday. We exchanged a few texts.

That's all it was.

We never slept together. There was nothing more than that.

I couldn't figure out, no matter how much I thought about it, why I was this fixated on her.

It wasn't something reason could explain. My instincts were reaching for her, that was all.

If it isn't Harumi for the rest of my life, I don't think I could ever be satisfied. That's the level at which the two of us happened to meet.

I started drawing for Harumi. I started playing piano for Harumi. And now I'm starting to write a novel for Harumi……

All of this I started after turning thirty. Looking back at my twenties, there was a version of me that couldn't have imagined any of it.

Coming up through All Japan Pro Wrestling, wherever I went, people relied on me for physical things. Any time something needed muscle: "Just ask Iwakami-san" — that was always the answer.

Being relied on for strength was fine. I'd trained harder and longer than most people.

But strength wasn't the only thing I'd built in myself. Inside, I'd always felt something complicated about it.

I wanted to change myself. Not just as a physical presence — I wanted to change in every sense.

That's why I've been drawing, playing piano, and now writing.

I tell myself it's for Harumi — but really she might just be the trigger. I'm still struggling, even now……

Enough of that, enough——

If I have time to look back, I should be writing.

Kitanaka suddenly announced he was going on a trip. Leaving the shop entirely to me and Noji, he said he'd be gone about ten days.

I asked what would happen to my days off.

"You're not getting any. Think of it as the chance to earn more."

Kitanaka, speaking with that particular brand of entitlement. A man who throws other people around for his own convenience and feels no gratitude for any of it.

Well — fine. As long as I'm here, I have the freedom to write and play piano. I could complain endlessly. I won't.

"Oh — one thing. Who's the registered name on this shop? I've never heard. Could you tell me? If the police ever come, I'd have no idea how to deal with it." "Urayasu."

"What — but didn't Urayasu-san disappear……"

"Urayasu's name is fine." "That's not the issue…… Could you at least get that sorted out properly? This is the kind of business that gets raided."

Two or three black-market video shops in Kabukichō got raided every month. Game parlors got it even worse.

If anything, police were more aggressive about shutting down game parlors. They'd gradually disappeared, and the empty storefronts were being filled by video shops.

I had a feeling crackdowns on video shops were going to increase soon.

This was the business we were running. If I didn't know the basics when the police came, it would be my problem.

"And the protection arrangement for this place — tell me who it is. In case yakuza ever come to cause trouble." "The XX-kai and the XX Alliance, right?"

"Those are the offices upstairs. Are you actually paying protection to both of them?" "No, that's different."

"Then who is it?" "Maniwa-gumi, Tachibana-ikka, Nishidai, Fujimi Kōgyō…… It's fine. I've got standing with all of them."

"That's not what I'm asking……" "I'm busy right now getting ready to leave for the Philippines tomorrow. We'll talk properly next time."

And with that, Kitanaka walked out of Melon. A truly irresponsible man. Philippines — he was just going to buy women, obviously……

In his place, Osaka from the pachinko floor came down.

"Kitanaka-san was just upstairs again. I slipped away saying I was going for food." "He's playing the machines again?"

"Probably. He was looking over the accounting sheets, checking the IN-OUT gap." "Apparently he's heading to the Philippines."

"Ah — our manager Koizumi is going too, I heard." "What — Koizumi-san as well?"

Koizumi, the one person in that place who'd seemed reasonably decent. I'd heard he was careful with savings — and even Koizumi was going to buy women? I was a little taken aback.

With Kitanaka on his Philippines trip, I ended up working every shift through to the end. The work itself was slow, so no matter how many hours I put in it wasn't tiring.

Without the goal of writing, it would have been unbearable — but I kept a positive frame around it.

On the other hand, I wouldn't have to go to that reeking warehouse, and Kitanaka with his relentless demands was gone. I could work in peace. I could throw myself into the novel.

Noji, who'd gotten used to me, came in at the end of his shift beaming: "Man, I had a drink last night for the first time in ages."

"Did you go out somewhere?"

A snack bar came to mind. Come to think of it, I hadn't been to one in a while either.

"Don't be stupid. I'm sending a hundred thousand yen to the Philippines every month. Where would I get money for that?"

Separated from his family every day. How did he get through it.

"But if you were drinking……" "I bought two cans of cheap beer and drank them in my room."

Noji, who'd clearly been in this industry a long time. Was he really saying he couldn't afford to go to a bar?

Come to think of it, in the warehouse he was always drinking canned coffee from the shop, or drinking straight from a two-liter bottle of oolong tea. He'd never looked like a man spending lavishly.

"But even sending a hundred thousand — do you have anything left over to save?" "No chance. My pay is two hundred thousand."

"Wait — seriously?"

He was earning less than me. None of it made sense.

"Send that, pay for food, nothing's left."

True — if you ate out three times a day, a hundred thousand yen would be gone fast.

Feeling something for him, I took three thousand-yen notes from my wallet. "Noji-san — treat yourself to a beer sometimes." And handed them over.

"What — really? Thank you, thank you."

Noji went back to the warehouse in high spirits.

The next day, when he came to Melon with a delivery order, he said politely: "Thank you for yesterday." To be thanked that sincerely for something that small — what kind of life had this man been living? Still, being thanked felt good. I smiled and let it pass.

When would Noji next be able to visit his family in the Philippines. I had no idea — but I had the feeling this man needed to be living more happily than this. He was someone who kept others at a distance and rarely opened up, but his roots seemed good.

I'd thought of Noji as simply filthy. Now I felt something like warmth toward him.

Ten days later, Kitanaka came back in high spirits and started spreading souvenirs out from a paper bag in the shop.

I thought maybe he'd give something — but he handed me an expensive-looking bottle of perfume with instructions to "take this upstairs to the XX-kai and XX Alliance offices, and say it's from me." Nothing for the staff. Going to a yakuza office on an errand like this, even for work, wasn't something I'd enjoy.

Well — this was the business we were in. The yakuza upstairs would occasionally appear with time on their hands and make small talk.

I climbed the narrow staircase and knocked on the second-floor door of the XX-kai.

"Yes."

A short reply came from inside, so I opened the door. A member came forward.

"Oh — Iwakami-chan. What's up?" "This is from our Kitanaka — a souvenir from his Philippines trip."

"Hey, thanks. The boss'll be pleased. Tell Kitanaka-san we said hello." "Will do. I'll be on my way then."

I closed the door and headed up to the third floor.

This time the XX Alliance. Same knock.

"Yeah, what?"

I opened the door and bowed.

"Hey — isn't that Iwakami-han. What's going on?"

The boss, Okamura, came out himself.

"This is from our Kitanaka — a souvenir from his Philippines trip. Please." "Oh, appreciated. Tell him thanks."

"Will do." "Ah — Iwakami-han. Got a favor to ask."

"What is it?" "Got an acquaintance who's after some S&M stuff. Could you get about ten together?"

"I can't say for certain we have ten, but I'll check. I'll get back to you." "I've got something to take care of in about an hour or so. I'll pop into Melon around then."

"Understood. I'll have something sorted out by then." "Much appreciated."

Back at the shop, Kitanaka was showing off photos of Filipino women he'd taken on his phone — "Look. This is how popular I am" — going on about it with visible pride. Not souvenirs but souvenir stories, repeated over and over. A man who was beyond any doubt a genuine piece of work representative of his type. People like this getting hold of money — that's why Japan goes wrong.

When he ran out of things to say, Kitanaka announced "I'm going upstairs" and left. Selfish as ever. Better without him there, honestly.

About an hour later the boss of the XX Alliance, Okamura, came down to Melon. I handed over the S&M videos I'd prepared.

"Appreciated, Iwakami-han. Mind if I have a smoke?" "Please, go ahead. All I have is canned coffee — would you like one?" "Thanks."

Okamura had the expression of a genuinely good-natured man. If you didn't know he was a boss, you'd think he was an ordinary person — he had that kind of easy warmth.

"So — Kitanaka-han's still here." "Yes — is something the matter?"

"Bits keep reaching us, you know. That he's doing some rough things."

Kitanaka had a side business lending money to people in Kabukichō. Convinced he had standing with yakuza, he apparently ran the lending operation without any protection arrangement in place. From the yakuza's point of view, that would obviously be a problem.

"He is rough, that man." "Well — what he gets up to where we can't see it, that's one thing. But if he acts up where we can, we'll have to hold him to account."

"That's fair." "I suppose bringing this up with Iwakami-han sounds like complaining. Forget the small talk."

"Not at all." "Well — I should be going. Thanks for the coffee." "Don't mention it."

After Okamura left, I went back to the novel.

Footprints left in the snow

Two weeks since I started writing. Multiple times during that stretch I'd gotten sick of it and nearly given up.

I'd figured — roughly three hundred pages, I'll just write until I get there. But the reality was I still hadn't reached a hundred. Novelists really are something……

Honestly, I had no confidence I could write two hundred more pages. The climax I'd planned was almost within reach.

That made sense. I was doing this with no study, no preparation — just decided to write a novel and started. No matter how fired up you are, this might be where a beginner hits the wall.

My motivation had clearly dropped.

I'd worked hard on this, written through nights when I should have been sleeping. There were days I couldn't stop and kept writing at the Melon table until morning.

And yet I still wasn't at a hundred pages……

Maybe drive alone isn't enough. And even if I finished it, Harumi wouldn't look at it. Once that thought took hold, the motivation I'd had — so much of it — deflated further and further.

When it came down to it, everything I did was half-finished.

All Japan Pro Wrestling — that fell apart. Saying I'd been a bartender at the Asakusa View Hotel didn't mean anything now. Piano — just Zanarkand and that's it.

Drawing — I'd been treating old results as glories, flattering myself. The novel — still rough and unfinished……

I'd fallen into self-contempt.

Back in the World One days, when money was still coming in, I'd been fine. Excess money meant I could paper over all of that.

Now it was different. I wasn't earning enough to paper over anything.

The reality was that I was a frog in a well — people in the shadow trade telling me "Iwakami-san, you're impressive" was all I had. Compared to people who went through university and graduate school, what I'd been building was on a completely different plane.

Us — the failures of the shadow trade. Obviously on the losing side of life. There are moments when you can grab money through shameless means, but those moments are genuinely brief.

The winners are different. Year by year they take home better and better pay without shame, and they never need the police. No matter how much you struggle and fight back, there's no reversing course in this life. Everything I'd built across my years felt like it had been demolished in one blow.

People at the pachinko floor knew I'd started writing. Some of them would say with real heat: "Iwakami-chan, fight for it — get yourself out into the sunlight."

How was I supposed to get into the sunlight. In this state……

Go back into training, get up on the ring again?

"……"

I know better than anyone that world doesn't work that way……

Back then, training without sparing sleep, forcing food down until I'd be sick in my sleep. Nothing like that now.

The sharpness I had when I was young. It feels like something from a very long time ago.

Pride in my physical strength — that's all I had back then. When did it turn into this?

Throwing myself into piano, I lost the physical condition that had been my one thing in exchange.

That made sense. Time is equal for everyone — you can't change that. The hours I'd spent doing push-ups and squats, I gave to the piano keys instead.

Now — how much does writing this novel actually mean? The more I think about it, the lower I feel.

Why did I even want to write a novel in the first place. Wanting to reach Harumi was part of it — but before that, it was about wanting to surpass Bōzu-san's monstrous skill in some other form.

Not by the direct path, but by a different angle. In other words — a shortcut, same as cheating.

And even the cheating has hit a dead end. A strange pride keeps building while I go on getting more and more worthless.

That's enough. What's broken is broken. I surrender……

This is exactly why Harumi won't look at me.

Today I'm meeting Bōzu-san. I'll tell him honestly what's going on in my head.

— end —

*Translator's note: Tōspo — Tokyo Sports, a Japanese tabloid-style sports newspaper.
*Translator's note: Vampire Hunter — known in North America as Darkstalkers, a Capcom fighting game series.

闇　32（物事の真相とピアノ月の光編）