I would like to tell you about a real experience I had when I was in high school.
Let me just say that the place is in the center of the Chugoku region.
It is a story that took place in the old school building of a certain high school, which has now been replaced by a new school building and may now be demolished.
It was the summer vacation of my first year of high school. I was a member of the volleyball club at the time.
We had a one-week summer camp at the school, just like any high school.
We practiced until about 9:00 p.m. at night, of course, and after that we had meetings and so on.
After that, we had meetings, etc., and all the members went to bed at 23:00.
However, we were still in our teens and had plenty of energy, and none of us went to bed before bedtime.
Then, one of the older members suggested that we try a test of courage.
The school building I used when I was in high school is called B, and an even older school building is located on the site of B, which is called C.
The C school building is a building with quite a story behind it. It was apparently used as a field hospital during the war.
According to a story that has been passed down from generation to generation, if you enter the C school building on a summer night, you may experience what is called a “flashback.
Flashback? When you enter the C School building on a summer night, the wartime scenery appears in a kind of flashback.
They all said that there was no way that this could be true.
In the end, there were six of us, including myself, who took part in the test of courage.
We came to the entrance of the “C” school building and decided to enter in pairs and take turns.
I was paired with another member of the club, and we were unlucky enough to be the first to enter the C school building.
Originally, the ground floor was used as a dirty cafeteria even then.
I could easily enter the school building, but I heard that the really bad part was on the second floor.
But where was the stairway to the second floor? Actually, no one knew where it was.
We had to start by looking for the stairs to the second floor.
Even though the building is used as a dining room during the day, it is pitch-dark inside at night.
We didn’t have a flashlight or anything, and had to rely only on the faint light of a street lamp coming in from outside.
I searched inside the diner for 10-15 minutes and couldn’t find anything that looked like stairs at all.
I gave up and was about to go outside when I heard a man’s voice saying, “Don’t go outside”.
“What? !” and we both looked at each other, “Did you hear that?” We exchanged words in shaky voices, “I heard it.”
I tried to force myself to convince myself that it was probably the seniors outside.
Unfortunately, there was no chance of that, as the other four were waiting far away in front of the B school building.
We were already shaking so badly that we were both pissing our pants, and we wanted to run away, but for some reason we just couldn’t bring ourselves to do it.
We probably only had been there for about five minutes, but we had regained our composure and decided to go outside for the time being.
We were about to go outside for the time being, when suddenly the other one said that there was something in the kitchen.
But he said “it was okay because I didn’t feel scared”.
I guess he was relieved to hear that, or maybe I was too, because he said it was a good opportunity and that we should go.
I decided to go into the kitchen.
I am not psychic, so I followed behind the other one, thinking the atmosphere was scary.
And as I went deeper into the kitchen, to my surprise, I found the stairs to the second floor.
Now that I think about it, the staircase was in a place so unnatural that
Perhaps the existence of that staircase itself was hidden from the students so that they would not know about it.
I was scared, but my curiosity got the better of me.
Both of us went up to the second floor silently, as if we were being sucked up to the second floor.
The moment we went upstairs, we both regretted coming up.
There were dozens or hundreds of unidentifiable presence that even I, with my zero sense of psychic, could clearly sense.
I think we both felt in our heads that this was a really bad situation.
At the moment we were about to run away, we felt like we were in bondage, and we couldn’t move at all.
The next moment, I heard the voice I heard earlier again, “Don’t go outside.”
With our bodies unable to move, we both looked at each other and nodded.
And the next moment, it suddenly became bright outside.
Fireworks outside? I thought at first, but it was not that bright.
I remember it was so bright it was as if it was back to daylight.
Soon my body started to move, and I looked fearfully outside.
I heard an earth-shaking “thud, thud, thud” sound far away.
I could then clearly feel hundreds of presences outside the school building, along with a stench that pierced my nose.
Was this the kind of wartime scenery that has been passed down from generation to generation?
How calmly I thought, but strangely enough, the feeling of fear was gone at that moment.
When I came to realize that it was dark outside again, with only streetlights to brighten things up, and the stench was completely gone.
After that, the unidentifiable presence I had felt earlier mysteriously disappeared, and the fear I had felt before disappeared.
We both walked out of the C school building with an indescribably fluffy feeling, as if we were in a dream.
Then we silently returned to the B building where the four of us were waiting.
There, an older student said to me, “You guys came back too soon.”
No, no, I thought, it’s been at least almost half an hour, and then I looked at the clock in the school building.
It had been less than five minutes since we had entered the C building.
Both of us were laughed at by all four of them, but it didn’t matter.
We returned to the room where the futon was placed, without exchanging a word.
After that, I heard that the remaining four students also went into the C school building, but nothing special happened.
The summer camp ended with the two of us being called “chicken” the whole time we were at the camp.
We decided to keep the incident between the two of us.
I really wanted to talk to someone about it,
I went to the candy store right outside the school after school and told the owner, an old lady, everything that had happened.
Then, the usually smiling grandmother suddenly burst into tears and told me that her husband had died in the war.
She told me that her husband had died in the war and that she had been sent to the hospital there (the C school building) as a nurse.
I heard that every year near the Bon Festival, her husband would come back.
I heard that there was always a terrible stench wafting in the air before he came back.
I asked her why they didn’t tear down the old school building.
“If we tear that place down, they won’t have enough room for all the injured patients.
And my husband would not be able to come back.”
I remember feeling a little sad that the place was so important to my grandmother.
I skimmed through it, but it didn’t scare me at all, and I apologize for my poor writing.
It was the only scary experience I have ever had in my life.
And now that I think back on it, maybe that earth-shaking sound was the sound of the atomic bomb being dropped, and the voice that said “Don’t go outside” was a warning that it was dangerous to go outside.
I still remember the stench that hit my nose and the voice that said, “Don’t go outside”.
When I went back to my hometown this past GW, I dropped by the candy store, but it was already gone.
I should have checked the C school building, but somehow I couldn’t bring myself to do so, so I left the place.
That’s all. Sorry for not being scary at all. My apologies.
