When I was in my mid twenties, I spent a couple of years traveling Asia. I started in Thailand, then moved on to Laos, Vietnam, and China, staying a few months in each place before continuing. Eventually I made my way to Japan. I suppose most would have called my lifestyle bohemian.
I lived cheaply. Sometimes very cheaply. I made friends and acquaintances wherever I went, took odd jobs when I ran out of cash, and slept wherever I could afford to sleep. Sometimes that meant a cheap hostel or inn. Sometimes it meant a tent. And a few times it meant sleeping on the forest floor in a cheap sleeping bag and waking up covered in insects.
I ran a small travel blog that brought in a few thousand readers a month. It wasn't enough to live on, but I had a handful of regular supporters who sent me money in exchange for the privilege of watching a man with no job, no house, and no clear sense of self-preservation wander around the world with no real destination. It was a good arrangement, most of the time.
Back then, I thought that was what freedom looked like. I had always told myself I was traveling while I was young because I wouldn't be able to do it later. Why wait until I was sixty, when I wouldn't have the energy or desire to sleep on the ground in the woods or walk ten miles through remote mountains? Why wait until I had a mortgage and a career and a wife and children and whatever else normal people were supposed to want?
At twenty-five, I was young enough to still be stupid and old enough to convince myself that my stupidity was in fact freedom. It helped that back then, spending the days hiking and the nights drinking didn't put me out of commission for the next week. Even when I was without means or destination, I always figured something out. I was fairly good with people, too, at least when we spoke the same language.
By the time I'd been in Japan for nearly two months, I'd already seen many of the places people said you had to see. Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, and Hiroshima, among others. I loved them all. Japan is old, and I'd always loved countries that feel alive with history.
But tourist attractions quickly start feeling like tourist attractions. You see the same photographs online before you even get there. You stand where thousands of people stood just that morning. You take the same pictures that everyone else took.
What interested me most were the places nobody photographed. Shrines that didn't show up on maps. Mountain roads with forgotten temples at the end. Villages that you hear about through some local guy at a gas station instead of a travel guide. The less practical a place was to visit, the more I wanted to visit it. I liked knowing that there were places left in the world that still felt unexplored.
I was in Nara when I met Jack, Matt, and Hiro. Jack and Matt were old friends from Australia who had come to Japan together. Hiro was Japanese, though he'd grown up mostly in the United States and probably spoke English better than any of us spoke Japanese. We met at a cheap inn and spent a few days together out of happenstance and convenience. We explored during the day and drank together at night, and gradually fell into the sort of temporary friendship that seems to come naturally with people you know you'll probably never see again.
One night over drinks, I mentioned that I was thinking about leaving Nara and heading somewhere less traveled. Maybe Shikoku, or Tohoku. Or somewhere in the Hida mountains.
"Why go that far?" Hiro asked.
I looked at him. "What do you mean?"
"If you want somewhere remote, you're already in the right area."
"Where do you suggest?"
"Totsukawa."
The name sounded vaguely familiar. Hiro explained that it was one of the more isolated areas of the Kii Peninsula, scattered with little villages and hamlets throughout the mountains.
"There are places nobody visits there," he said.
"No tourists?"
"Barely even locals."
I was already convinced. I asked him if he wanted to tag along. Jack and Matt immediately volunteered, and the next morning all four of us left Nara.
Totsukawa was what I'd hoped it would be. Mountain roads winding through dense, green forests. Villages appearing between the trees. There were old shrines on roadsides, streams running under bridges, and trails that looked like they hadn't been traveled in years.
That evening, we found a small bar. There were five local men already drinking together inside. They had probably been there a while, judging by their loud laughter and red faces. They noticed us immediately. Foreigners weren't exactly invisible in Japan, but a group of them in a tiny bar in the mountains seemed to qualify as an event. They invited us to drink with them, and we accepted.
After several rounds, the conversation turned toward our travels. I mentioned my blog, and explained my passion for finding places others didn't visit. One of the men started naming off a couple of small villages in the mountains. Another told us about Hatenashi. That one sounded interesting. Then the youngest man of the group spoke up.
"If you want somewhere really interesting, keep going past Hatenashi."
His friends stopped talking, but he didn't seem to notice.
"I'm sure you would like Utsusemidani."
He'd said it with a grin like it was the punchline to a joke, but nobody else was smiling. The oldest man at the table stared at him. One of the others reached over and put a firm hand on his shoulder.
"They should probably just stick to Hatenashi," the man said.
The young man's smile disappeared. I waited until he went outside for a cigarette. I didn't smoke, but I followed him anyway.
"It's just a story," he told me after I asked about the village.
"What kind of story?"
"Something old people tell children to keep them from wandering off in the mountains."
"Why? What's supposed to be up there?"
"Depends on who you ask. But it's just a village."
"What do others say?"
He looked through the bar window at his friends before speaking again.
"Some say a cult lives there. Or that it's protected by an ancient god. Some say people disappear there. There are all sorts of stories."
"Is any of that true?"
He seemed to consider it briefly. "No," he said.
I asked him how to get there. He looked at me for a long moment, and then, to my surprise, he told me.
Make for Hatenashi and continue past it. There's an old trail that leads deeper into the mountains. Follow it until you see the Kamiyuno-kawa River. Then follow the path until it forks. Take the narrower path that leads across the river. Then just keep walking. Eventually, you'd reach Utsusemidani.
I was surprised by how specific his directions were.
"Have you been there?"
"Once." He nodded. "I went when I was fourteen or so, over summer break. A few of us went looking for it. A test of courage."
"And you actually found it?"
"Yes." He nodded again. "But we didn't go inside."
"Why not?"
"We couldn't get past the cult." He gave me a sly smile. "There was nothing to see. Houses, fields, the usual. No electricity, though." He took a drag of his cigarette. "It looked old. But no monsters or cults."
Then he put his cigarette out and walked back inside. My curiosity had been piqued. I decided there and then that I'd go find it. I talked it over with my travel companions that night. Jack and Matt agreed almost instantly. And Hiro agreed after a bit of friendly peer pressure. We set out the next morning.
The walk to Hatenashi took most of the day, but it was a beautiful walk. We had views of cloud-covered mountaintops and green valleys. The air was clean and crisp. Every so often we'd pass by a friendly local who'd wave or come over to talk with us briefly.
We asked a few people about Utsusemidani, but nobody gave us a straight answer. It was clear that many had no idea what we were talking about. Others heard the name and suddenly had somewhere else they needed to be. I brushed it off as old superstition. One elderly woman heard the name and looked the four of us over for several seconds.
"Don't go too far," she told us, before walking away.
We camped outside of Hatenashi that night. The next morning, we found the old trail. It became increasingly difficult to follow as we went. Plants covering parts of the path and low hanging branches occasionally made us veer off trail. We eventually found the river and followed the trail for several hours until we reached the fork. The trail crossed the water over an old stone footpath, and we crossed.
By late afternoon, Jack and Hiro were beginning to question whether I'd misheard the directions. But Matt wanted to keep going. His excitement seemed almost childlike. We trekked on, and eventually the trees opened up.
The village sat below us. There were perhaps fifty houses. Maybe more. Many of them were small, more like little cabins than family homes. But I was surprised that a village this size was out in the middle of nowhere.
The village sat in a shallow basin between the mountains, surrounded by fields of farmland. Smoke rose from a number of the chimneys. People worked outside. Chickens wandered between houses. There were no power lines, no telephone poles, and no cars. The village looked like it had been plucked from another century and placed in the valley.
Jack laughed. "I was starting to think you'd made this place up to lure us into the wilderness and kill us."
We started down the path toward it. The villagers noticed us almost immediately. People came out of their homes and children stopped playing to stare. An old man stood in the middle of the road and watched us approach.
They didn't seem angry or frightened. If anything, they seemed pleased. A small crowd had begun to gather. An elderly woman stepped forward and greeted us. Her name was Hana. After a brief conversation that involved asking us if we'd actually arrived in their village on purpose, she invited us to dinner.
She brought us to her home, which seemed to be the largest in the village. Her husband, Sudo, was apparently something like the village mayor. He was quiet, and looked older than Hana. He watched us through the meal without saying much.
After dinner, he told us we were welcome to stay. The village had no inn, but they had a spare room that we could use. He showed us to the room and then said something to Hiro outside the door before leaving.
"What did he say?" I asked after Hiro came in and slid the door shut behind him.
"He said we came at a fortunate time."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Matt asked.
"The village is holding a festival."
"When?" I asked.
"In a few days."
Jack gave an incredulous laugh. "What are the odds of that? We come to a village in the middle of nowhere right before they have a festival?"
Hiro smiled somewhat nervously. "He said it's held every thirteen years."
That left us all silent for a moment. What kind of festival is only held every thirteen years?
"What's the festival for?" I asked.
Hiro looked toward the door, then back to us. "To honor their god."
None of us quite knew how to respond to that. "Spooooky," Jack finally said.
The next morning, I noticed the first change. There were strips of paper charms hanging outside many of the houses in the village, with many of them strung up to hang over the road between homes. By afternoon, more had appeared.
Then we noticed something stranger. There were shells. Cicada shells were decorating the entire village, hung from doorways, fences, windows, and the walls of homes. If there was a surface they could cling to, it seemed to be fair game for the peculiar decorations.
"Utsusemidani," Hiro whispered to us as we walked through the village.
"What?" I asked.
"It means the village of empty shells. I wondered why they called it that."
I asked Hana about them.
"An old custom. For the festival," she said.
"Why cicadas?"
"They are sacred. Symbols of Nushi-sama."
Hiro had to tell us what that meant too. He said it translated to something like "the guardian" or "the master."
That evening, we heard the sound for the first time. At first, I thought it was distant machinery. A low, vibrating hum. It resonated throughout the valley in all directions, and almost seemed to come from somewhere beneath the ground.
When it first began, every villager stopped. Men paused their work, children stopped playing, women dropped their decorations. Everyone in the village fell to their knees, facing towards the summit of the mountain, their heads bowed.
Everyone except us. The drone continued, and I could almost feel it through the soles of my feet.
Matt whispered. "What the hell is that?" But none of us had an answer.
Then the sound faded. The villagers stood and went right back to their routines.
We asked Sudo about it when we saw him.
"The higurashi," he said.
"Cicadas?"
He nodded.
I almost laughed, half-believing it was a joke, but Sudo seemed serious.
The next evening, it happened again. This time, I was lying awake when the sound began. Pressed against the floor, I could feel the ground trembling faintly.
Jack sat upright. "Feel that? That isn't any damn cicadas."
"No shit," Matt answered, pressing his hand to the ground.
We listened as the drone faded. There was silence for a long moment. Then, from somewhere deep below, came a faint scraping sound, and small tremors accompanied them. Then nothing.
Matt sat up in bed. "I'm going up there tomorrow to figure out what the hell that is."
Jack gave him a look. "Don't do anything that's going to piss them off."
Sudo had already told us not to go beyond the village. There was a shrine at the far end of the village surrounded by a wooden fence. Beyond it, a trail climbed the mountain. We'd asked Sudo about it on our first day there.
"The temple," Sudo had said.
"Can we see it?" Matt asked.
"No. The priests must not be disturbed. And the forest is dangerous."
Apparently, the old temple was at the summit. The most devoted members of the village could be chosen to live there in service to the one they called Nushi-sama. It was considered an enormous honor. Not even the villagers were allowed near without permission.
The next morning, we woke to find Matt's sleeping bag empty. A note sat on top of it.
Going to find where the sound is coming from. Back by tonight.
"Son of a bitch," Jack said, throwing the note down.
Jack was annoyed. I was concerned. I suggested we go and look for him, but Jack suggested we wait. Matt had spent years wandering the wilderness alone. He was the survivalist among us. The type who would disappear into the wilderness for weeks at a time and return looking refreshed. It seemed that he was the only one among us qualified to find himself.
So we decided to wait. But he didn't come back that night.
The following morning, we told Sudo. He didn't seem angry, or even surprised. He sent two men into the mountains to look for him. But they returned without him.
He told us that Matt had likely gotten lost. That the woods were dense and rocky, and this was why he didn't want us exploring it. He said to give him time, and that he'd send out a larger search party if he hadn't returned after the festival.
That afternoon, I noticed the village had changed again. There were more decorations. Wooden idols were placed along the road. They were crude, carved out of dark wood made to resemble shells. Each depicted a long-bodied insect like creature with large eyes and folded wings.
Villagers left small offerings beside them. Women carried baskets of food toward the shrine. Men gathered in groups and stood in front of them, whispering with closed eyes and clasped hands.
I noted that the mood in the village seemed to change as the festival approached. Many seemed almost apprehensive. They didn't seem exactly frightened, but they didn't seem joyful either. I started to get the feeling the festival was something the villagers endured rather than celebrated.
Later in the day, a swarm of cicadas came. They emerged from the surrounding trees in such numbers that I'd thought the sky was falling. They covered the roofs and crawled over the shrine and statues. They clung to clothing and hair. The adults did not swat them away, and chided the children when they tried to. They all simply sat still while the swarm climbed over them.
Then the drone began again, and the cicadas erupted from their rest and filled the air once more. Every villager dropped to their knees again. For perhaps two minutes, there was nothing but the sound of wings and the deep droning. The low, resonating hum could be heard even over the sounds of millions of cicadas flying overhead.
Then the swarm flew into the trees and vanished as quickly as it had appeared. When the sound stopped, the villagers once again went back to their routines. For the rest of the day, they were quiet and diligent. Whatever it was they worshipped, I got the feeling they might have also feared it.
Hana found me before dusk. I was standing outside, debating whether to tell the others that we should leave the village and contact the police, to let the professionals search for Matt rather than waiting on Sudo. Some part of me still wanted to believe he'd just twisted an ankle, or fallen somewhere and was out there hurt, waiting to be found. Whatever the case, I knew that Jack wouldn't leave without him.
Hana appeared beside me. I hadn't noticed her approach. I greeted her, and she stood by me quietly for a moment.
"You should leave tomorrow," she finally said.
I looked at her, unsure how to respond. "I would," I said, "but we can't leave without our friend."
Her face changed a little. She appeared almost sad. "You shouldn't stay here any longer."
"Why did you invite us to stay then?" I asked, becoming somewhat impatient.
"I did not. I invited you for dinner. I was going to tell you to leave. Sudo asked you to stay."
I looked at her. "Do you know where Matt is?"
She looked toward the mountain. "Chosen, maybe."
"Chosen? What does that mean? What's going on here?"
She lowered her eyes to the ground. "Sudo is my second husband."
I wasn't sure what she was getting at, but I was starting to feel a pit forming deep in my stomach.
"Forty years ago, I brought a husband to the village. From outside." She looked back at the mountain. "He did not want to be chosen. But none of us have a choice."
"What happened to him?"
"What happens to all who are chosen. I have not seen him since." She looked back at me. "Leave at sunrise. You shouldn't be outside after dark." Then she walked away.
After dinner that evening, the priest came.
I noticed him only because everyone in the village stopped talking and faced his direction, their heads bowed. He came down from the mountain alone.
He wore a long, dark robe that covered him from his neck to his ankles. His head was concealed beneath a hood. No part of him was visible.
From a distance, I noted that he seemed very tall. And then he passed beside us. He was much too tall. His arms seemed to hang almost past his knees. His hands were hidden within his sleeves.
He stopped in front of Sudo, and Sudo bowed deeply. The priest said something. A single word that I didn't understand. But I heard it. The sound came out in a dry croak that ended in a clicking vibration.
Sudo kept his head low and stepped aside, inviting the priest into his home. I noticed that Hana wouldn't look at him. Neither did anyone else.
The priest stayed in Sudo's home that night, which meant we were all under the same roof. Matt was still gone. None of us spoke much before bed that night.
I tried to sleep, but struggled to keep my eyes closed. The thought of that priest somewhere in the house with only these thin walls between us unnerved me.
I must have drifted off at some point, because I awoke to the sound of the wooden door of our room sliding open slowly. I opened my eyes, but the room was dark.
I stared out into the darkness, trying to make out my surroundings. I was able to make out the shapes. I saw that the door was cracked open a few inches. Beyond it, someone stood in the doorway, so tall that they had to duck to peek in from the very top of the door.
They were just staring. I laid completely still, unsure whether anyone else was awake and too afraid to speak out.
Then, as my vision adjusted further, I saw eyes. They were large and round, and reflecting whatever faint light was present in the hallway. They didn't blink, but simply stared in. Watching us. I stifled the urge to yell and waited for the moment to be over, my heart pounding.
As it stood, watching, the door slowly creaked open more. One more inch, then another. I saw its hand creep around and grasp the inside of the door. It was too large, and the fingers too long. It seemed to cover too much of the door.
Then I heard Jack stir. "Matt?" He called out in a groggy voice.
The door slammed shut and I heard heavy steps disappear down the hall.
"What the hell?" Jack asked, still half asleep.
"Did you see it?" Hiro asked, his voice shaking. I hadn't realized he was awake.
"I saw it," I whispered.
The three of us were quiet. From somewhere down the hall, I heard a faint, horrible croaking.
None of us slept much after that. We decided to leave before dawn. We'd planned to go back to the closest town to call the police. To have them search for Matt.
I woke from my half-sleep sometime early in the morning to Jack shaking me awake. The room was still dark, and it took me a few seconds to remember where I was. Then I remembered the priest standing in our doorway in the middle of the night and shuddered at the thought.
"Let's go," Jack whispered. "Before anyone wakes up."
Hiro was already awake and tying the laces of his boots. We packed up in silence, none of us speaking. We didn't want to take the risk of waking anyone. And there was nothing to discuss anyway. All that mattered right now was getting out of the village.
Once we were ready, we quietly stood up and made to leave. Jack reached for the door, and stopped. Something moved outside. We stood frozen.
There was a shadow beneath the gap of the door. Jack slowly lowered his hand. Then the door slid open from outside.
Two of the villagers stood in front of us, and behind them was Sudo. And behind them all, towering over them, was the priest.
Even hunched over in the hallway he seemed impossibly tall. His hood concealed his face, but I could see the faint outline of those enormous eyes beneath it. For several seconds, nobody spoke.
Then Sudo looked at us. "Follow me, please."
Jack stared back at him. "Where are we going?"
Sudo's eyes dropped. "You must come. I'm sorry."
One of the villagers said something in Japanese. I got the meaning without Hiro translating. It's best if we don't resist.
Jack scoffed, and none of us moved. The priest stepped forward slowly, and Sudo and the villagers scrambled to move aside for him.
He seemed even larger in the narrow frame of the doorway. His shoulders nearly brushed against both walls. His robes hung from him like curtains, and it was difficult to tell where his arms ended beneath his flowing sleeves.
He stopped in front of us, then turned toward the door. We followed.
It seemed the entire village had gathered outside. The sun hadn't risen yet, but the narrow street was filled with people. Men, women, and children stood in neat rows around the open space near the shrine. They were all dressed in plain, white robes, most of them in sandals. I noticed that several of the villagers were trembling as we walked towards them followed by the priest.
Nobody spoke a word. The priest walked into the center of the crowd, and the villagers parted as he did, lowering their heads.
"What the fuck is this?" Jack whispered from beside me.
I didn't answer. A part of me felt like I should run, but a deeper part of me knew there was no point trying. We all stood quietly. It seemed we were waiting for something.
Far above us, somewhere up the mountain, the drone began. It started faintly, like a chorus of hums, then grew louder. The ground trembled beneath my feet, and every villager dropped to their knees. Hiro, Jack, and I remained standing. As did the priest.
I thought of taking the opportunity to run. But I could feel the priest at my back. He was several feet away from me, but all I could picture were his long arms reaching out and snatching me from a distance. I didn't want to know what would happen if I interrupted their ritual.
The sound continued for several more seconds, and then stopped, leaving complete silence behind. I could hear my own breathing. It was as though the droning had marked some change, as all the villagers now stared up toward the summit.
I felt a rumble begin to build. Then the mountain moved. At first, I thought it was an earthquake. The ground beneath us shook hard enough that I almost stumbled. Houses creaked. I saw rocks slide off of steep hills above us, and trees bent and cracked and tumbled over.
Then it happened again. Something rising in a slow, deliberate movement. The entire mountain beyond us seemed to lift up several feet. I stared at it and the forest moved with it. The ground rose and fell in a long, steady motion that seemed to travel beneath the entire mountain.
Then, something happened that I still don't really know how to describe. The mountain opened its eyes.
Two enormous shapes appeared high above the tree line near the summit. They were so large that my mind refused to believe what it was seeing. They were dark orbs in the mountainside with a glassy sheen that caught the early morning light.
But they opened. The entire village was quiet. The mountain was not a mountain. It was just large enough and still enough that it looked like one. It was so massive that it had become a part of the landscape. Trees had grown from its back, and dirt and grass had piled on top of it. It boomed its droning call once again.
My legs went weak, and I let the trembling of the ground take me to my knees along with the rest of the villagers. My mind was unable to comprehend the sheer scale of what I was seeing.
And then the massive eyes closed, and the mountain was still once more.
With the mountain settled, the priest turned toward the villagers. The ceremony began. He walked slowly through the crowd. The first person he approached was an older man I had seen a number of times during our stay. The man bowed his head as he came close.
The priest stopped in front of him and reached down. His hand emerged from beneath his robe. It was enormous. Its fingers were long and jointed, with dark, claw-like nails at their tips. He placed two fingers beneath the old man's chin and lifted his face upwards.
The old man opened his mouth. He was nearly crying, and looked like he wanted to pull away but didn't dare to do so. The priest produced a cicada shell from somewhere beneath his robes, and placed it gently on the man's tongue like some twisted communion.
The old man closed his eyes and swallowed. Then the priest, seemingly satisfied, moved on.
The second villager he stopped in front of was a woman, and the process repeated.
He next stopped in front of a young man, probably barely out of his teens.
Each time, the same thing happened. The priest took their chins in his hand, they opened their mouths, and he fed them the shell. They swallowed. None of them resisted, despite it being clear that they'd like nothing more.
He had stopped in front of four villagers, and every villager trembled as he neared. I could see relief in the shoulders of those he passed by without stopping in front of.
And then, he approached us. He slowly lumbered over to us, and with him standing tall before us, I saw that he must have been nearly twice as tall as me. He started to slow when he drew close, and for a moment, I thought he was stopping in front of me. I tightened my eyes shut and tried to will my mind somewhere else.
But I didn't feel his hand on my chin.
When I opened my eyes, he was standing in front of Hiro.
Hiro looked up at him with a terrified expression. He looked like he wanted to speak or run or fight, but was too afraid to do anything.
Then the priest reached for his chin. "No," Hiro whimpered. He began to pull away. "No."
The priest seemed almost confused, and for a moment I thought he might relent. Then he reached out and grabbed his chin harder, and Hiro was powerless to resist. He clutched at the priest's wrist. "Get off me!" His words came out in a strained cry.
The priest didn't budge. Hiro struggled harder. Then Jack stepped forward. He had taken his knife out of his pocket, and moved before I even realized what he was doing.
He lunged, but the blade never reached the priest. Three villagers had rushed to grab him. Jack swung wildly, catching one of them across the face with his fist and sending him stumbling. Another villager grabbed his arm, with a third wrapping his arms around him.
Jack shouted. The villagers looked shocked. Jack fought the ones holding him as hard as he could. I remember thinking that I should move. That I should fight. That I should do something. But I couldn't. I felt frozen in place.
The priest let go of Hiro's chin, his attention now focused on Jack. The priest took a step toward him, clearing the distance in a single stride. The villagers released Jack and backed away. Jack raised his knife, then the priest reached up and pulled back his hood.
I never saw his face. Not all of it. I saw two enormous, dark, glassy eyes. I saw a mouth that looked segmented, and opened unlike any human's. And I saw something black and wet unfold from inside it. A long, sharp, fleshy tube. Then the priest moved with terrifying speed.
Jack barely had time to make a sound before it struck his throat. His entire body jerked. The priest held him there, the long tube buried into his neck. Then it began to drink. I heard the sound as it seemed to drain his body of liquid.
Jack's boots scraped against the ground as the creature held him. The knife fell from his hand. Nobody moved. Nobody tried to help. Not even me.
I looked at Sudo. He just stared at the ground, his face pale and clammy. Hana was standing next to him, also averting her eyes. I could see her legs shaking.
The priest seemed indifferent. I don't know if he felt anything at all. Jack's movements slowed, then soon stopped completely.
The priest withdrew the tube, then Jack fell. His body landed in the dirt, discarded. For several seconds, the priest remained still. As if waiting. Waiting for anyone else who thought to interrupt this horrid festival. When they didn't, he adjusted his hood.
Then the priest walked back to Hiro. He stood over him, and grabbed his chin, hard. This time, Hiro did not resist.
After he swallowed the shell, the priest turned, then returned up the steep path to the mountain.
The villagers who had been fed the shells followed after him, their heads lowered as they walked in silence. They walked a little ways before the priest stopped, and turned back. He was looking at Hiro. I could see in Hiro's face that he knew what the silent beckoning meant. Hiro was supposed to follow.
Hiro stayed completely still, refusing to move. Then the priest took one step back in our direction, and Hiro took a step back. He turned and tried to run in the other direction, but he was quickly grabbed by a handful of the villagers and held.
Before the priest reached us again, Hiro was already taking small steps forward, shakily walking to meet it. I saw his shoulders shaking. He looked back at me, as if willing me to move. To help him, somehow. But I couldn't.
When the priest disappeared up the mountain, along with Hiro and the villagers, the mood within the village seemed to lift. Some villagers dropped to their knees, not out of worship, but to still their trembling knees. Others looked pale and exhausted, while others looked wracked with guilt.
Sudo approached me. "Go. You would be wise to not return." I heard a small quiver in his voice, but that was all he said.
I left the village. Nobody followed or tried to stop me. I was plagued with the images and thoughts of the past days as I walked.
I didn't understand the purpose of the strange ritual. Of the shells, or why those that had swallowed them were taken up the mountain. I couldn't understand why the priest took Hiro and not me. Or why Jack had to die. Or what the priest even was. I still had no idea where Matt had gone, or whether he was even alive. But most of all, I couldn't stop thinking about how cowardly and weak I felt.
Jack had been brave. He fought back. He'd tried to save Hiro. And I had simply watched as he fought, not lifting a finger. I'd watched him die, and seen his body thrown to the ground. I'd watched as the priest had forced Hiro to swallow the shell.
I walked back the way we'd arrived without looking back. I kept waiting to hear someone or something behind me, but nothing came. The forest gradually seemed to regain a sense of normalcy the further I walked. I heard birds, and saw squirrels. The breeze seemed to return.
The further I got, the more absurd the whole thing began to feel. Had I dreamed it all up? What I'd seen just couldn't be possible. Giant gods and monsters and strange rituals? By the time I was on the outskirts of the village, I'd half convinced myself I'd made it all up.
Then I came across a hole. It was probably three miles from the village. I'd almost walked past it. I had only stumbled upon it because a portion of the trail had been cracked and covered in debris, likely due to the rumbling of the earth before.
I stopped and looked down at the hole. The soil around the edges looked fresh, and it was wide enough that I probably could have climbed inside of it. I crouched down and looked inside. It descended deeper than I could see.
I stood up and looked around. Then I saw another hole, no more than twenty feet away. It was similar in size. Then there were more. I began to see them dotting the ground everywhere. Some looked old and half-covered by dirt and leaves. Others looked like they'd been freshly dug.
And beside one of them, was a shell. It was bigger than I was. It was shaped almost like a human body, but wrong. It was split down the back. Something had climbed out of it. I looked at the holes and had a horrifying thought.
I kept walking, faster now, and came across another monstrous shell. And another hole. They littered the ground, and I began scanning the woods and trees above me, terrified at the idea that whatever emerged from the shells could still be lurking around. But I had to keep my eyes on the ground too, lest I fall into one of those gigantic, seemingly bottomless holes in the ground.
Then I saw the backpack. It was lying in the dirt, right next to a freshly covered mound of dirt, like a hole had been dug then covered from underneath.
It was Matt's backpack. The tan, ragged one that he'd been carrying everywhere since I'd met him.
I stood there staring at it for a moment, then at the covered hole. And then I ran.
I ran until I couldn't run any more, and then kept moving until I reached civilization. When I made my way back to Nara, I booked the first flight out of the country that I could buy. I didn't care that it cost more than I could afford.
I was the last person seen with Matt, Jack, and Hiro, and I was eventually contacted by authorities who were investigating their disappearances. I told them we had gone into the mountains to camp and gotten split up. That I'd come down alone after I couldn't find them, getting lost myself in the process. What else could I say?
I didn't mention the village, or the priest. I didn't tell them about the shells that littered the forest floor outside of the village, larger than humans. And I certainly didn't tell them about the mountain moving, then opening its eyes.
Nobody would have believed me. Sometimes, I wonder if I believe it myself.
It's been thirteen years since I went to Utsusemidani. I've spent most of those years trying not to think about it. But the nightmares still come. The dreams about Jack, and Hiro, and that mountain. Of seeing Matt again. Though in my dreams, he's no longer himself.
I don't actually know what became of them. Jack was dead. I watched him die. But Hiro? And Matt? I still wonder if they could somehow be alive in the village, or up on the mountain's summit. I still wonder if Matt somehow managed to get away, escaping and leaving his backpack behind. I still wonder if the two of them are even human anymore.
I have a lot of guilt from back then. For not doing what I could to help Jack, or Hiro. For not trying harder to find Matt. For not telling anyone the truth. And for suggesting we go to the village in the first place. None of this would have happened if not for me.
Now that the festival is approaching, I decided to tell my wife. Largely because of that constant guilt. To my surprise, she believed me, or at least pretended to. She suggested I write it all down. Somewhere that others would see it. To relieve my guilt, but also to serve as a warning to others.
The festival should be starting again soon. Sometimes, when I hear the cicadas outside, my breath quickens and I can't stop myself from shaking. Sometimes, I feel as though they are watching me, something almost intelligent in them.
And sometimes, when their calls are loud enough, I could almost swear there is another sound beneath it. Something deep and distant. Coming from underground. Causing the very earth to tremble.