Starting a Night Shift Part-time Job at a Convenience Store.

By the following day, the distinct claw marks on my neck had all but vanished, so much so that it was almost like they had never existed from the beginning, not even a single scab to be seen.

In front of the mirror in the bathroom at home, I made a face that was irredeemably moronic but that was inevitable because I had definitely seen it with my own eyes whereas in the bathroom of the convenience store, I spotted painful marks on my neck, as if I had scratched myself to the hilt.

For whatever reason, when I examined myself in the mirror this morning after washing my face to check on my condition, no such mark was in sight.

Not that the swelling had really subsided or anything but there was nothing there.

This was strange. It was evidently peculiar. I mean, even before the marks on my neck went away, the experience of that time was indescribable.

About that, I wondered what that was… Somehow, I was liberated from the inexplicable suffering when Hirai arrived halfway through the process, but what would have transpired had she not been there?

Until now I didn’t give it much thought, but ever since starting my part-time job at the convenience store, a number of mysterious experiences had already befallen me.

Like wind, garbage, and optical illusions…

I had thought so many times before, but I had convinced myself otherwise. For once, I couldn’t conceive of an explanation for this mysterious phenomenon.

Tonight’s work was only ten or so hours away…

I looked around my modest room. On the desk by the window was the cheap laptop I typically used for finding a part-time job.

My younger sister was not coming over today. The other day she told me she was going to see a movie with her friends.

After making a mug of instant coffee, I booted up my laptop, which I seldom used. From the desktop screen, I connected to the Internet, hovered over the large search bar in the center of the first Google page that popped up, and typed the words, clicking them with one hand.

“X prefecture, X city, Sea of Trees, Niko Niko Mart.”

Within a second of lightly pressing the enter key, the search results were displayed.

The web search results showed 12,300 results… Wow, it turned out to be quite a lot…

Lowering the cursor on the screen, from among the ridiculously abundant results, I spotted the one that struck me as the most eye-catching, and I clicked on that page first.