The pastries Yoshino bought from the bakery with the costumed baker tasted just as good as they looked. As time passed, other people in town got to know about the store, and it soon became popular. Every day, customers crowded into the redbrick building for a chance to get their hands on some delicious baked goods.
Today, though, Yoshino wasn’t lining up outside it with the others. She was on her way to a different store—the Signage Seller.
“More… I need more! I’m gonna bring more and more lovely stores to this town!”
Yoshino had always wanted to live someplace where shopping was actually exciting. And now she could. Day after day, she bought more Store-Calling Signs. As soon as she got a new one, she’d fill in the blanks and stick it in one of the many empty lots around town.
Clothing store THAT SELLS brands popular with elementary school kids WANTED HERE!
Accessory store THAT SELLS stylish one-of-a-kind handmade items WANTED HERE!
Restaurant THAT SELLS gourmet dishes that regular people can afford WANTED HERE!
And with every sign, another lovely store arrived in town to set up shop.
“I want a cake shop, and an ice cream parlor, and a candy store… A traditional café, a diner, and a sushi restaurant… A bookstore, a stationery store, a video game arcade… While I’m at it, I might as well bring in a new convenience store, a hundred-yen store, and a drugstore. I’m sure they’ll be nicer than the ones we have now! And then, and then…”
Amazing as the whole thing was, there was still something strange about it. Without exception, the stores summoned by the signs were all staffed by people in animal costumes. The clothing store had rabbits, the accessory store had squirrels, the restaurant had foxes; every store was like that. They wore the costumes for their entire shift and never took them off in front of the customers. Nobody had ever seen what any of them looked like underneath their animal outfits.
It was strange, all right, but it wasn’t really a problem. Everyone in town was thrilled with the new stores. Some people wondered how and why they kept springing up out of nowhere, but no one ever guessed they had anything to do with the signs Yoshino was putting up.
Thanks to the new businesses, the town was becoming more and more lively. While the new stores did great, the ones that had been there from the start found it hard to keep hold of their customers. Sooner or later, they all ended up going out of business.
Yoshino did feel kind of sorry for the owners of those stores, seeing them close their doors for the last time, but it really couldn’t be helped.
This just shows that people like the new stores with the costumed staff better. It’s sad, but this is just the way it is.
Customers had the right to choose where they bought things, after all. If the old places couldn’t attract enough people to stay in business, it was their own fault. It was a lot easier to think about it that way.
Now that those stores have closed, though, there’s a lot of space that’s not being used anymore… What a waste!
In the beginning, there’d been so many disused buildings and empty lots that finding somewhere to put the signs hadn’t been a problem. Since Yoshino had used most of the better locations around town, it was getting harder to find new ones.
It’d be nice if I could do something with the stores that closed down…
She decided to try an experiment. One day, she went to one of the old stores, one that was just an empty building now, and stuck a sign in the corner of it. This wasn’t like the empty lots she’d used before, but the sign slipped into the asphalt just as easily as it had in softer ground.
And the next day, a store had opened up there. It wasn’t like a new business was using the old building, though; it looked completely different. It was more like the previous store had vanished without a trace and been replaced with a new one.
“Huh. So I don’t need to use completely empty spaces for the signs to work.”
She tried it in other places, too, like the backyard of an empty house. The ground there was nice and soft, but the sign refused to go in, no matter how hard she pushed.
“Hmm… I guess if there’s already a building there, it needs to have been a store for the sign to work… Oh! But that means every old store that closes creates a space for a new one!”
That was a happy discovery as far as Yoshino was concerned.
As the days and weeks went by, the stores that had gone out of business were replaced with new ones, all staffed by people in mascot costumes. There were, however, some stores that stubbornly held on despite their dwindling customers. They had been in town so long that they’d become regular fixtures, just part of the scenery.
But that scenery was changing. Next to all the bright, trendy new businesses that the signs had summoned, these old relics stuck out like sore thumbs.
How annoying. With all these lovely stores in this town, the old ones just don’t belong anymore.
It was time for another experiment.
Yoshino bought a new Store-Calling Sign and tried sticking it into the ground near a store that was still running. The result? The pole sank in smoothly and easily. The next day, that old store was gone, with a lovely new one in its place.
“How about that. You can use the signs like this, too!”
Now things were getting really exciting.
“In that case, I can make this town even better by turning all the stores into cute mascot ones!”
Everyone will be a lot happier that way.
Yoshino put her plan into action instantly. She no longer limited herself to places she personally wanted to go to. Even stores she’d never had much interest in were fair game now. Bars, opticians, craft stores, stores for electronics and home appliances… She put down signs in front of all of them, replacing them with new-and-improved versions. Soon enough, almost every store in town was run by costumed characters.
✦ ✦ ✦
Things went on like that for a while. Then, one day, Yoshino was watching a TV show that featured a store whose specialty was potato croquettes. It was a little butcher shop in a far-off town. Locals would drop by on their way home from school or work to buy piping-hot croquettes, biting into them then and there while they were still nice and crunchy…
“W-wow… Those look sooo good…!”
The moment she saw them, Yoshino knew she had to try one for herself.
“I wish there was a place that sold croquettes like that here in this town! So warm, so crispy… I bet they taste great as an after-school snack!”
She wasn’t about to just sit there imagining what that would be like. Not when she could go buy another Store-Calling Sign. It would summon a butcher shop equally as good as that one and run by someone in an adorable animal costume to boot.
But as it turned out, it wasn’t that simple. With all the “improvements” she’d been making to the town lately, Yoshino had actually run out of places to put signs. There weren’t any empty lots, abandoned buildings, or shops she didn’t like anymore. They were all occupied by lovely stores with mascot characters working there.
No, wait… Not all of them. There was still one old store she hadn’t replaced yet.
The Signage Seller… I can still switch that out for something new!
The next day, she set off to buy just one more Store-Calling Sign.
I guess this’ll be the last one. But that’s okay. This town’s got more than enough lovely stores for me to enjoy now.
She did feel bad about what she was going to do to the Signage Seller, considering everything it had done for her. But once it was gone, there really would be nowhere to bring in new stores. The town would be full, and Yoshino could finally just enjoy what she had. Better to do it now and get it over with.
She opened the paint can, filled in the blanks, and stuck the sign in the ground right outside the old store.
The next day, the Signage Seller had disappeared. In its place was a quaint little butcher shop, and the air was filled with the delectable aroma of fresh, crispy potato croquettes.
✦ ✦ ✦
“All right, time for me to go shopping in my lovely new town full of lovely new stores!”
It was the weekend, and Yoshino was ready to hit the streets. She’d been spending her money on Store-Calling Signs for so long, she hadn’t had any cash left over to spend on other stuff. Now that she didn’t need any more signs, she finally had some allowance to spare.
“This is probably only enough for something from the bakery… But that’ll still be fun! Let’s go!”
She left the house and made the short walk to the charming redbrick building with the teddy bear worker and delicious baked goods inside. But when she arrived…