Each light was about the size of a human head, and they were all different colors. Red, yellow, purple, green, orange, red, lime green, then red again. They were proceeding along in single file, snaking their way in between the trees.
When the lights got close enough to be seen clearly, Nanami doubted her eyes.
They were floating in midair.
They were balls of fire floating along in midair, not supported by anything and not held by anyone.
“No...way...... or maybe yes way......?” Right after doubting her eyes, Nanami doubted her doubt. Perhaps these were hanging from a string at the tip of a long pole, like traditional Japanese lanterns. Or so she thought, but no matter how much she squinted, she couldn’t see the telltale strings. Even though it was nighttime, the balls of fire were doing a pretty good job illuminating the surrounding area. If there were strings, then those strings should be visible from reflecting all the light.
Nanami’s breathing turned erratic, and a cold sweat broke out. Those are...... could it be that those...... are the souls of the people who’ve died here in Aokigahara————
“Don’t make a sound.”
“KYAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!”
The voice coming from behind her caused Nanami to almost jump out of her skin and scream at the top of her lungs. The surprise attack that seemed exactly like a perfectly-timed jump scare in a horror TV show sent her heart on a chain of a thousand explosions.
The person who had spoken to her turned out to be an older man, a suspicious-looking uncle. He was wearing a black full-body raincoat, and his hood was pulled so far forward that only the bottom of his face was visible. The raincoat was decorated by various weird squiggly patterns and cursive-like script. It was a getup like something that she would see on a TV program about the eccentrics who had gathered in Tokyo.
The suspicious uncle looked at Nanami exasperatedly. “Shh! I said to not make a sound! You don’t want to be drawing their attention either, do you?”
“Wh-Who’s ‘they’?”
“Those hitodama. The human souls.” While bringing an index finger to his lips in a gesture for silence, the suspicious uncle used his other hand to point to the floating balls of fire.
The slowing swaying hitodama had stopped their procession. The foremost one was barely 10 m away. It was so close that Nanami could smell something similar to burning gasoline coming from it.
Although it had no face, and so she wasn’t sure, Nanami felt like the hitodama was looking at her. She was gripped by a terrible fear, as if all her insides were churning in place. Tears sprang to her eyes. Why was she in this situation? Because she tried to kill herself? If she got caught by the hitodama, then surely a fate even worse than death awaited her. She could feel it in her bones.
After several tens of seconds of the greatest terror that Nanami had ever experienced in her life, the hitodama slowly resumed moving again. Just as they had been doing before, they continued floating and swaying their way through the night forest. The shadows cast by the light of the hitodama illuminating the trees fell on Nanami again and again.
Eventually, the last hitodama made its way past in what felt like a purposely slower pace to spite them. The suspicious uncle heaved a sigh of relief. “Phew. We’re good now.”
“Hi...ha—ah......” Nanami had to struggle a bit to remember how to breathe. By repeatedly taking shallow breaths, her completely zoned out brain finally received the oxygen it was demanding and gradually resumed normal operation.
A quick glance told them that the hitodama were already quite a distance away now, and were showing no signs of returning.
Nanami enjoyed a brief moment of respite, but then realized that she was hardly out of danger. Who exactly was the suspicious uncle in front of her? Why was he in a place like this? What did he know about the hitodama? Every single thing about him seemed suspicious.
As someone whose conversations hadn’t progressed past anything more than “Don’t need a bag, thanks” to convenience store cashiers for the past few months, it took quite a bit of effort for Nanami to open her mouth to ask, “Wh-Who are you?”
“Who, me? Oh, just call me Suspicious Uncle,” replied the suspicious uncle frankly.
There wasn’t really anything for her to say in reply to a suspicious uncle introducing himself as “Suspicious Uncle.” She only knew that the instant she allowed herself to think it funny and laugh out loud, it would be her loss. But that aside... all right then, guess this suspicious uncle can just be “Suspicious Uncle.”
“Those hitodama are the souls of espers who’ve died. When espers die, their souls get trapped inside places with unique magnetic fields and become unable to pass on. The ones just now were pyrokinetics who had lived at the end of the Edo era. More specifically, they had died around the Keiou era, which was 1865 to 1868, if you aren’t good with history. I believe that during their time, they would have been called ‘black arts practitioners,’ if I recall correctly.” Suspicious Uncle was just flapping his mouth, dumping exposition onto her even though she hadn’t asked. “I had read about them in an ancient text, and just thought, wow, 150 years? How can you not feel bad for them? So that’s why I’m trying to find a way to help them pass on. But it’s a bit......” Suddenly, he paused, and jerked his chin toward Nanami. “What about you? What’re you doing here?”
“Ah, I’m Nanami Okishima. I was previously looking for a job, but I guess you could say that I’m here looking for...... enlightenment.”
“Suicide, huh. I guess that makes sense, can’t really think of any other reason why someone would be here in the middle of the night. Oh, but I’m not here for that, just saying. Want a smoke?”
Having braced herself against a whole spiel about not committing suicide, Suspicious Uncle’s light-hearted response completely caught Nanami off guard. He cheerfully proffered a cigarette, so she accepted it gratefully. She had ended up chucking away her last one when she first spotted the hitodama.
Immediately after lighting it up, she realized that it wasn’t a tobacco cigarette, but a chocolate one. It was a slightly pricey snack that had recently gained governmental acknowledgment as a substitute for smokers trying to kick the habit. It was indeed a snack, but it still properly emitted smoke. As Nanami enjoyed the sweet fragrance of the chocolate in smoke form, Suspicious Uncle took a puff and immediately started choking violently.
“What the hell, this thing gives off smoke?!”
“Uh, of course it does. What did you think it was?”
“Some aromatic kinda thingy? Ah screw it. It feels like breathing in smoke from a campfire that tastes like chocolate.”
“Don’t worry, everyone’s like that with their first stick. You’ll get used to it by your second or third one. And chocolate cigarettes don’t have any harmful substances inside either.”