Tokyo: The Player Behind the Scenes

The platform has also changed its appearance. It is no longer in its old-fashioned style, but has been modernized. It should be the time around the millennium when the boy actually lived.

It's afternoon now, and there aren't many people on the platform.

Higashiyama Shin tried to move, and his outstretched hand could pass through a man making a phone call in front of him without any obstruction.

His eyes quickly scanned the platform, and soon he found the father and son.

At that moment, the father was standing behind the yellow line on the platform, his head down, holding the little boy's hand.

Higashiyama Shin walked over, and as he approached, he could clearly see that the little boy's father was trembling.

Even their breathing was rapid and tense.

Shinichi Higashiyama stood there quietly, watching the plot unfold.

Suddenly, as if he had made up his mind, the father took advantage of the station attendant's brief departure, picked up the little boy, and leaped over the safety line onto the tracks.

Instantly, the platform descended into panic and chaos, filled with screams, shouts, and curses.

This was during an economic crisis, and the suicide rate was soaring. People were able to see news about suicides, and many were even witnesses.

Today, they will witness yet another suicide.

"What bad luck, why did I have to choose the Yamanote route? What a waste of time."

The man in the suit, who was in a hurry, frowned and complained irritably.

"Which one is this month? The eighth or the ninth?"

The two young people started joking and teasing each other.

"That man had a child with him, oh my god! Help him!"

A woman, unable to bear it any longer, shouted.

Others, perhaps not wanting to witness the bloody scene that was about to unfold, covered their eyes and left the platform.

"Damn it! Sir, come up here right now!"

The station attendant, caught off guard, panicked and dropped the megaphone. Feeling the vibrations caused by the approaching tram, he turned pale and dared not jump down to gamble on being able to save the other person in time.

He lay on the edge of the platform, stretching his hand out as far as he could towards the man on the tracks.

"Come on up! Sir! What you're doing is extremely dangerous! No matter how hard life is, don't give up hope! The child is innocent! He still has a future!"

The boy's father had his head down, holding his little boy tightly, breathing rapidly, his clothes soaked with sweat.

"Dad? Dad? Is that person talking to us?" The little boy wearing an eye patch looked up in confusion.

"No."

"Dad, can we skip the doctor's appointment today? It really hurts so much!"

"We won't go anymore, we won't go anymore, Dad will go with you."

"Yay! Daddy's so great!"

The father's hand trembled slightly, as if the rationality he had lost due to immense mental pressure had returned to his brain.

The tram was already approaching, almost in sight.

"Huff, huff." The man's breathing was disordered, as if he couldn't catch his breath.

The little boy was a little nervous and grabbed his father's arm: "Dad? Are you feeling unwell? Should we go to the hospital? I'm not afraid of pain anymore, not today."

The man clenched his teeth and cried out with difficulty, tears streaming down his face.

"Sir! Sir! Please give me your hand!"

The station attendant, lying on the edge of the platform, kept shouting in a hoarse voice.

On the platform, eyes that were filled with worry, indifference, or excitement looked down from above.

"I'm so sorry, Yuxiang, please forgive me."

In the final moments before the train arrived, he lifted the little boy high in the air and threw him toward the station staff.

"Got it! Sir, come on up quickly!"

"It's too late! Quickly pull the station staff away!"

"It's about to hit!"

Clang! Clang!—Whoosh!

Snapped!

The afternoon sun vanished in an instant, and the platform screens began to flicker, the images distorting in waves, and a jumble of noises rushed past our ears like a moving train.

Darkness rapidly engulfed them, and the surrounding "people" flickered before completely merging into the darkness and disappearing without a trace.

Shinichi Higashiyama regained the presence of his real body, but it was pitch black all around, and even the camera he had been holding was gone.

But the flowers and ultraviolet light on her body are still there.

"Woo."

The faint sound of sobbing came from behind.

Higashiyama Shin turned around and saw the little boy kneeling on the ground, covering his face with his hands and crying bitterly. The only light on the entire platform was from his body, which was faintly visible.

"Waaah... I don't want treatment anymore, Daddy, please don't leave me!"

The boy's voice was filled with despair, but Shin Higashiyama could sense that the atmosphere around him seemed to be jubilant.

The light gradually spread from the little boy, and the various monsters that Higashiyama Shin had seen on the platform were staring greedily at the little boy and him.

Higashiyama cautiously took two steps back, but he had already reached the edge of the platform and could not retreat any further.

Below was pure blackness; jumping down would be certain death.

The monsters, drooling, were about to head towards Higashiyama Shin.

"Stop hurting others. Please, eat me. My despair is enough to fill your stomachs."

The little boy stopped them with his broken voice, slowly got up from the ground, lowered his hands from his face, and two lines of bright red tears of blood flowed from the hollows of his eyes.

As he spoke, a spirit that looked exactly like the boy but was entirely black floated up from the boy's back, emanating a thick black aura.

The appearance of this spirit caused the surrounding brightness to drop sharply again, and the kerosene lamps on the walls and pillars flickered.

"Wow!"

The ghosts greedily clung to it, their sheer number forming a writhing ball as they frantically tore at the boy's spirit.

The boy's spirit twisted and convulsed in pain, but offered no resistance.

"Brother, let's go. There are people waiting for you at home, but I have no home anymore."

The little boy's body, holding the camera that had somehow returned to his hands, slowly retreated, taking the terrifying ghosts with it, and disappeared completely into the darkness.

Bang, bang, bang.

The sound of the train arriving at the station could be heard.

The old lights stopped flickering, and the surroundings were bright again.

Higashiyama Shinichi stood silently in place, feeling the movement from the pocket, and took out the photo.

The photograph gradually turned to ashes, and the embers coalesced into a human figure. After glancing back at Shinichi Higashiyama, it drifted away in the direction where the little boy had disappeared.

The warning sound came as the train doors were about to close, and only then did Shinichi Higashiyama turn around and enter the carriage.

[Shinagawa Station, arrived. Next stop is Kisaragi Station, towards your final destination. The doors are about to close, please be careful.]

Higashiyama Shin regained his composure slightly.

Kisaragi Station

The game has come to an end.

Chapter 79: The Secret of Time

Inside the moving train, Shin Higashiyama tidied up his belongings.

One ultraviolet lamp.

A bouquet of flowers.

One train ticket.

These are all things that seem useful, and since they exist, there's a high probability they can be used somewhere.

The principle that if there is a gun, it must fire.

Flowers can enhance a character's will to survive and their potential.

See if the ticket disappears later. If it disappears, it means it was only used for this train.

Ultraviolet lamp.

He picked up the ultraviolet light and began to examine every part of the train.

In just a few glances, he discovered a very obvious mark, the kind that didn't even require an ultraviolet lamp.

He leaned closer and saw that there were messy words of different colors on the old car wall.

Some were engraved, some were painstakingly left with a pen, and some were even written with lipstick.

1 [Left on March 15, 1995]

2 [Left on March 18, 1995]

3. [Leave a message on March 15, 2019: Please don't give up]

4. [To the brother above, March 15, 2019: Why haven't I seen you?!]

5. [March 15, 2031: Now that we've come this far, we'll definitely be able to get out.]

6. [On March 15, 2031, I boarded the last train in Kita-Senju and accidentally fell asleep on the train.]

7 [Posted on April 18, 2031: I took the train to Nakameguro around 7:00 AM, but I fell asleep during rush hour.]

8. [On April 18, 2031, I boarded the train at Hibiya Station! It was also around 7:00 AM, and although there were many people, I don't know why I fell asleep and ended up at Tsukiji Station!]

There was a lipstick left on the chair, and the color matched the fifth and subsequent comments, so the lipstick must have been left by the fifth person.

No, that color... it's the arrow he saw at Tsukiji Station, and the "Go to Hibiya" sign he saw at Kasumigaseki Station.

It turns out that was a reminder left by people from 2031. That makes sense, since who would carry crayons around? But most women would carry lipstick.

Many of the checkpoints along the way were physically demanding. For a woman to arrive here is even more absurd than the man he's currently controlling arriving here by sheer luck. She's another Tokyo superhero.

Those who can leave messages here have all survived near-death experiences. Judging from the recurring dates, it's likely that many more died along the way, just like the trial and error process in his game, with corpses paving the way.

Higashiyama Shin picked up the lipstick and continued writing below it.

9 [Left on March 15, 2037, the last train.]

After finishing writing, he put the lipstick back in its place, took two steps back, and took in all the messages.

He quickly compiled a lot of useful information.

Judging from the years, there are four time points in the messages here.

They are 1995, 2019, 2031, and 2037 respectively.

There is a very obvious mathematical pattern here.

1995+24=2019

2019+12=2031

2031+6=2037

So, what's the next step: 2037 + 3 = 2040?

Even if the last one is uncertain and just a guess, we can still know that the number added each time is halved.

As for the month and date, there are only two times.

September 3th and September 15th.

If I'm not mistaken, those who came in on March 15th caught the "last train," and the time was frozen at 1:00 PM.

The person who arrived on April 18th, however, inexplicably fell asleep around 7:00 AM and ended up on the train bound for Tsukiji Station. The time was approximately 8:00 AM.