About a Place in the Kinki Region p.4: "The Truth Behind the School Trip Mass Hysteria Incident" - an article published in the April 2006 issue of a monthly magazine
A highly regarded private school in Kansai, R Middle School, became a national topic of speculation after an incident of mass hysteria was reported to have occurred during a school trip. As it has been told by the students and other eyewitnesses, the events which transpired seem to defy common sense.
Across the media, initial reports and speculation approached it as an unexplainable event, but it was eventually concluded to be an incident of mass hysteria. We interviewed A-san, who was a second-year student at R Middle School at the time and attended the school trip. The interview went as follows.
The news called it mass hysteria, but that definitely wasn't it. Me and my friends, even the teachers, we all saw the same thing.
It's been four years since then, but even when I meet up with my old classmates, we avoid talking about it. Because someone died and all.
At that private school, the second-years would always go on this outdoorsy overnight thing once a year, like a school trip. All the second-years before us went to Okayama but from our year onwards it was changed to some place in ●●●●●. They called it a recreation centre, I think. Something along those lines. You know the place I mean, right? It was all over the news for a while.
Supposedly it was built pretty recently, and was honestly a nice place. They didn't just host school trips like ours, but stuff like company events too. It was leagues above those run-down old hostels, so everyone was excited.
In the daytime we did this 'walking rally' thing—kind of like a hike—and ate lunch at a campsite nearby. In the evening we went back to the recreation centre and had dinner in the cafeteria. After that, all the classes put on their own little performances. It was a good time. We all went back to our rooms around 8PM I think and were free to do what we liked until lights out.
The front of the building faced the highway but all our rooms were positioned at the back, towards the mountains. It was four to a room, and each room had a window that opened up to a small balcony with a view of the forest, but it was too dark to see anything out there at night. It was a two-storey building and all the rooms at the back were set up like that. Because of how it was laid out, some people spent their time hanging out on the balcony and chatting to people in other rooms. Some of the boys were playing a game of telephone with people on the floor above.
I was playing cards with a friend in our room, but the people on the balcony started to get really noisy and I was curious what was going on, so we asked them. They told us "there's a weird voice" and we said "whoa, scaaary" and went to go check it out.
By then, a bunch of students had crammed into the balconies and were leaning out to see what was going on. I could hear people on the floor above asking things like "huh? what's that?" and "do you hear that?"
If you listened closely, you could hear it. It was coming from deep in the forest.
"Heeey!"
It didn't really sound like someone calling for help, but it did keep repeating regularly, so they was definitely calling out for something. I think it was a man's voice.
Then a boy from a different class decided to call back. He was a troublemaker, but he definitely should've known better. He shouted back "heeey, heeey!" into the forest. And then another "heeey!" came in response. That boy repeated his "heeey, heeey!" all the while laughing about it with his friends.
This happened a few more times before someone pointed out "doesn't it kind of sound like they're getting closer?"
They were right. You could barely hear the voice at first, but by now they were pretty audible. Despite that, the only light we had was the bulbs in our rooms, so you couldn't see more than a few metres into the forest itself. At that point, though, I'm sure they were close enough that you'd be able to see them clearly if the sun was out.
It was causing a huge commotion now, and a lot of students were saying they were getting really scared. I could hear some of them closing their balconies and running back inside, while a few others were saying "I'm gonna get a teacher!" What about me? Well, obviously I was scared too, but I was more curious than anything. Everyone in our room was on the balcony, and we were all trying to look into the forest.
Just then, a girl from the room next to ours called out from the balcony towards the forest.
"What's the matter?"
That girl was the class rep for a different class. She was also running to be in the student council, so I knew who she was. She definitely wasn't messing around with the source of the voice, instead she was trying to figure out what they were doing.
I remember that everyone else on the balconies went quiet after she spoke, like they were waiting to hear what the voice had to say.
"Heeere, come over heeere, I have persimmooons!"
They were calling back loud and clear but, I don't know how to put it, it didn't sound right. It was like they were just monotonously reading a script. As if they didn't actually know Japanese. Like an animal imitating human speech.
Everyone was shocked still, too stunned to freak out. The girl called back, but I remember her voice was trembling a bit this time.
"What do you mean?"
Before she could even finish speaking, the voice called back.
"Heeere, come over heeere, I have persimmooons! Heeere, come over heeere, I have persimmooons! Heeere, come over heeere, I have persimmooons! Heeere, come over heeere, I have persimmooons!"
They just kept repeating themselves over and over.
Someone on a different balcony screamed out "nooo!" and then everybody started scampering back inside.
We were practically in tears as we ran back into our room, but then we heard someone shout out "hey! Who's there!?" It was a teacher. From where I was it was hard to see, but I could tell they were somewhere on the floor above. I was already halfway back into the room at that point but I looked back for a moment—when I saw a glare of light illuminate the forest. It was probably the teacher using a flashlight.
The beam of light wandered around ground level of the forest for a bit before it suddenly shone on something.
I honestly have no idea what it was, but I assume it was a person. I wasn't able to see all of them, the flashlight only caught their feet. They were unusually pale and large. Barefoot too, not wearing any shoes. When I say large, I mean they were really big. If that was the size of their feet, they had to have been at least three metres tall. But then they quickly dashed off into the forest.
The teachers called everyone to the cafeteria. They told us that the police had been alerted due to a sighting of a suspicious individual, and that we were not to go out onto the balconies no matter what. Then we were all sent to bed. A lot of the students were pretty rattled, some even felt sick. Originally we were all supposed to tour the nearby dam the next day, but the rest of the school trip was cancelled and we headed home instead.
The school held a meeting shortly after the trip, to explain the situation to our parents and all that. My mother attended. Apparently they found no sign of a suspicious individual. We were all told not to answer questions from the media.
This is something only the students know about, I think. The class rep from before started acting really strange after the school trip. She'd suddenly stand up in the middle of class and start yelling stuff like "I want to go to the mountains!" Then she stopped coming to school altogether. A few months later, she died. The teachers were vague about it, but it seemed like a suicide. Someone from her class told me that, when they went to her wake, the coffin was entirely closed—they didn't get to see her face at all. They were really broken up about not being able to give her a proper goodbye.
Translation Notes 1-8
The translation notes are organised by part. Please be careful of spoiling yourself by reading ahead.
This is an amateur translation of the web novel 近畿地方のある場所について as posted to kakuyomu.jp by the author 背筋. The web novel is freely accessible to the public, and this translation has no relation to any other adaptions. I claim no rights or ownership of the content presented.