Chapter 3 “Kamishana Station”
In the middle of the vast grassy plain, there stood a rustic station, seemingly abandoned. The floor of the concrete platform was cracked, and resilient weeds peeked through the gaps. The white lines were fading, and the braille blocks had become dirty from exposure to the elements.
The station building’s roof, made of rusted tin, gave the impression that it might fly off in the next storm. The posters affixed to it had faded and flapped in the warm breeze. They seemed as though they might peel off at any moment.
As for the crucial station name, it was written on a weathered sign that had seen better days.
“Kamishana…,”
It was an unfamiliar station.
Houzuki stood frozen in front of the open and abandoned train doors, uttering the name of the station.
It was neither Kisaragi nor anything they recognized; it was a station with a name that made no sense. Could a station like this really be an otherworldly station?
Then, as Houzuki stood there in astonishment, the silver-haired, red-eyed male student simply walked past her and hopped off the train.
“I see, so this is Kamishana Station.”
“H-Hey, wait…!”
Stepping on the platform with his leather shoes, Yuiru turned back to Houzuki, who had been left behind on the train, now overgrown with weeds.
“What are you doing, Houzuki? Don’t just stay there. Come on, quickly”
“But we don’t know what’s out there; I can’t just get off…”
“Not knowing what’s out there? That’s the thrill of it, isn’t it?”
With a tilt of his head, as if to say, “Strange, isn’t it?” Yuiru remarked
“I’m a ghost that feasts on other ghosts, but I also feed on human fear. You’re not only bait; your own fear of the attracted spirits will serve as a snack for me.”
“You’re greedy.”
“Call it what you will.”
In the heart of enemy territory, it seemed that this ghost cared little about the opponent’s scale.
Houzuki clenched her lips and made up her mind, stepping off the train. The moment she disembarked, the doors behind her naturally closed. They had been left open until now, but they closed as if they had been waiting for the precise moment she decided to step off.
With the doors closed, the train departed from Kamishana Station as if it were sliding away.
Gatan, gatan.
Gatan, goton.
The rusty tracks stretched far into the distance and eventually disappeared from view.
Having bid farewell to the eerie train, Houzuki once again surveyed Kamishana Station. The station, situated in the middle of a grassy plain with no houses in sight, was incredibly old. The roof was made of rusty tin, and the bench placed in the corner had faded. Houzuki discovered a vending machine, but strangely, it didn’t offer any drinks for sale.
It wasn’t a matter of being sold out; there was nothing on the display section. It was completely empty. The buttons had red lights that politely read “Sold Out,” rendering the vending machine useless.
“What on earth is this place…”
“It’s Kamishana Station.”
Yuiru, being already deceased, seemed to be fearless, standing on the tracks as he spoke.
“It’s one of those so-called otherworldly stations.”
“Then, is my missing classmate here?”
“Well, who knows? It’d be convenient if he was in this small station.”
From the start, Yuiru’s primary motive was the meal, and he appeared to be unconcerned about the missing male student. The callous spirit left the situation unattended, while Houzuki made her way to the station’s ticket gate.
This rural station, like many unmanned stations, had a dilapidated ticket gate. It was so damaged that even regular tickets, let alone IC cards, couldn’t be used to pass through. It appeared that you could board the train without paying.
Houzuki peeked into the stationmaster’s room. A pile of yellowed papers lay on the desk. The clock hanging on the wall had stopped, and its glass surface was shattered.
There were a few chairs, but all of them were damaged, with broken legs or missing backrests. It seemed like something had happened here.
Peering into the disheveled stationmaster’s room, Houzuki remarked,
“No one’s here…”
“Of course not. This is an otherworldly station.”
“Uhyaah!?”
Houzuki let out a silly scream as Yuiru spoke from behind.
“What are you… What are you doing!?”
“It’s quite pitiful to be so easily startled. Houzuki, there’s nothing particularly strange about looking at a stationmaster’s room like this.”
With a sly grin, Yuiru entered the stationmaster’s room through the window, picked up a single piece of paper scattered on the floor, and handed it to Houzuki.
The yellowed paper bore inscriptions in characters that were difficult to decipher. It wasn’t English or any other foreign language, nor was it a set of symbols. It was an entirely different, otherworldly script that Houzuki couldn’t read.
When Houzuki looked up from the paper, she saw the silver-haired, red-eyed male student wearing a mischievous grin.
“You see, you can’t read it, right?”
“T-then can you read it?”
“Of course not. My knowledge is stuck in the Showa era.”
After crumpling the yellowed paper into a ball and tossing it onto the floor, Yuiru nonchalantly passed through the stationmaster’s room wall to exit. It seemed this particular spirit had a fondness for doing things in a rather futile manner, as there was no need for him to jump over the window frame in the first place.
“More importantly,”
Yuiru turned back to Houzuki after returning to the station platform.
“Shouldn’t you think about a way to escape from this otherworldly station?”
“But, what about the missing student…”
“Do you really think a young girl who can’t even save herself can save others?”
Yuiru’s eyes, resembling the color of a sunset, bore straight into Houzuki.
“Besides, we already know what becomes of those who end up in otherworldly stations. They’re beyond saving anyway. Stop these futile actions.”
“Why… How can you say such things?”
“Sacrifices are a part of dealing with the supernatural. This Kamishana Station is probably no different.”
Yuiru’s words left no room for doubt. It was as if he had experienced it all himself.
This place was right in the heart of the supernatural. There seemed to be no way out, and for an ordinary human with neither knowledge nor experience, the only option was to pray for a way to escape.
Houzuki, too, couldn’t believe that their missing classmate would be safe. Nevertheless, she wanted to at least collect his belongings and return them to his family.
After all, wouldn’t it be pitiful otherwise?
To continue waiting indefinitely for a person who would never return.
“……I’ll look for him because I feel sorry for him.”
“Sympathy? Something like that won’t satisfy my hunger.”
Yuiru sat down on a faded bench and mused,
“But Kamishana… I wonder what this name means?”
“Isn’t it just arbitrary?”
“Don’t you understand?”
Houzuki, who was searching for the missing male student, turned to Yuiru, who was sitting on the bench lost in thought.
The malevolent spirit, taking on the appearance of a silver-haired, red-eyed male student, had a serious expression on his well-defined features. He seemed to be pondering something.
Could there be some significance in the name Kamishana Station? It appeared to be a name thought up arbitrarily without any particular meaning.
Yuiru looked at Houzuki and said,
“Doesn’t it sound like someone’s name? Especially the ‘Shana’ part. It’s often found in girls’ names.”
“True, it does sound like that.”
Houzuki agreed, and in the distance, the sound of a train approaching could be heard.
As they both looked up, the same train that had brought them, with its destination obscured, was gliding into Kamishana Station once again.
However, this time, there was a lone high school girl on board. She wore a jet-black sailor uniform with a bright red ribbon, her demeanor appearing downcast.
Her unkempt black hair hung like curtains, obscuring her face and rendering her expression unreadable.
She slung her tattered school bag over her shoulder and stepped onto the floor of Kamishana Station with scuffed black shoes. Upon closer inspection, her black sailor uniform was also in disrepair, with traces of dust and scuff marks evident.
The high school girl disembarked from the train at Kamishana Station without hesitation, and she watched the departing train as it left.
“…………Excuse me……?”
Houzuki addressed the new girl who had ended up at Kamishana Station.
“Trains don’t come here. Are you fine with that?”
“…………”
The high school girl nodded.
“Did you get lost?”
“…………”
The girl shook her head.
“Why did you come to Kamishana Station?”
“…………”
She doesn’t answer.
“………”
“………”
Even Houzuki found her perplexing. It was surprising that she had come to Kamishana Station of her own volition rather than having wandered in. Could there be some rumors about this place? Or had she come here to sacrifice herself? Feeling unease from the high school girl, Houzuki kept her distance.
“Hey, you,”
Spoken unexpectedly, it was Yuiru, sitting on the bench, who asked her,
“What’s your name?”
Though it wasn’t the appropriate moment for such a question, the high school girl answered Yuiru before Houzuki could react,
“… Kamishana.”
