The incident, in which the character for bone was scribbled on the blackboards of several classrooms, surprisingly reached the ears of my aunt. And it seemed to have made a bigger impact than she had imagined.
However, the rumors within the school were at best just about a pervert going around the school and doing strange things. Even after such a spectacular debut, the interest in the character ‘骨’ was still low.
We had thoroughly discussed the success of our strategy at the lukewarm attitude of the students. And after all the discussion, we came to the conclusion that it would be better to keep on with the ‘mysterious phenomenon’ without any gaps.
We had already done the scribbling on the blackboard. Doing the same thing twice or three times wouldn’t have the impact we wanted. Therefore, we needed a different form of advertisment.
What was the effect of the ‘Curse of Ohone-sama’?
Being covered with a lot of bones…That was what we thought in the beginning. So wouldn’t it be better to scatter around a bunch of bones in the school? But what kind of bones should it be?
“We can’t use human bones. Not to mention, it’s impossible to get hold of human bones anyway.”
“Actually, bones are hard to find, even if not human bones. We’d have to collect fried chicken bones on a regular basis.”
“…If we had enough pocket money to buy fried chicken, we wouldn’t be doing this. We would be playing at some game arcade-”
“Absolutely, that’s what we’d be doing!”
Perhaps it would be better to scatter pieces of paper with ‘骨’ written on them around the school? Though, it wouldn’t have as much impact as having it scribbled all over a blackboard…
While discussing our next step, we wandered aimlessly around the shopping district.
If we hung around at the vicinity of the Tanuki Shrine, people who came to give offerings would surely realize that we were the ones behind the prank…. So we decided to stay away from the Tanuki Shrine for a while.
Bones of any creature should do the job. Maybe we could rummage through the trashcan at a fried chicken shop… But that would be extremely embarrassing…
Just as we were pondering on different ways to get bones, the problem was easily solved.
A plastic bag full of bones in the trashcan behind a butcher’s shop entered our vision. We didn’t know which animal’s bones they were, beef or chicken, but it seemed we could get as many as we wanted for free.
What was more, there was even a note that read, “Please take as many as you like.” Maybe it was left there for people who own a dog so that they could take them to feed their pet.
Toru’s house was nearby, so I asked him to bring a plastic bag from the supermarket. After that, we started scooping out a reasonable amount.
“Eww… gross…”
“Well, it would be pretty scary if this is found lying around at school!”
“They will never know which animal’s bones they are! If we can place them in the shoe locker in the morning, the girls might even start crying.”
In the end, we decided to split up and bring the bones to school and place them in different places. This coincidentally worked very well with the special force roleplaying we played during the lock-picking game. In other words, the bones were explosives, and we were going to secretly set them off inside the enemy’s base.
And while doing so, we had to make sure no one caught us.
The last time when we did the blackboard operation, it was a surprise attack done on the enemies early in the morning. Because it was our very first operation in a new enemy base, we were extremely anxious. Fortunately, no one saw us and we were able to carry out the plan smoothly.
However, this time, the operation would be held during the day. We could see enemy soldiers swarming the school, patrolling around and watching for suspicious activities. Also, after the previous operation, the officers (teachers) have been keeping a stricter watch on the school perimeter…
That alone was enough to create a tough situation.
As soon as we stepped into the school gate, the bones, which I felt disgusted to touch at first, became like toys to me. In my imagination, they turned into bullets of a silver gun.
Since we were going to sneak them into the school, it was not suitable to bring very large bones. So we decided it was better to carry bones the size of fried chicken drumsticks or wings than large bones like a whole roasted chicken.
Dirty bones would make my uniform dirty if I left them as they were, and they would surely stain my uniform. So we decided to give them a quick wash under the faucet at the park, and then roll them up in tissue paper to dry.
This task had already become a part of our play, or rather, our strategy. While making sure there were no people around, we gathered at a water sink in the park and carefully prepared our explosive bone bombs.
The next day, each of us went to school, carrying three or four bones wrapped in tissue paper in our pockets.
The bulges in our pockets were strangely noticeable even to us. However, only we were the one who knew what was inside and such a situation was already exciting to us.
“Maybe we should have brought smaller bones just to be safe.”
“No, Agent Fox, we must plant big explosives for bigger impact! I’m going to wrap it in duct tape and bring it to you.”
If I had to carry a bigger bone, my legs would be sore.
“Wow, what did you just say? It sounded so cool!”
“Everyone, we must finish planting all the explosives by today! We can’t miss this opportunity to attack. And above all, don’t let the enemies know!”
“If the enemy soldier finds out our doings, the vigilance will be stricter. Everyone, be careful!”
“But there’s no point placing them in a place where no one notices… How troublesome.”
“Of course the operation is difficult. We have to set them in the most effective place without being noticed… It’s time to show your stealth!”
And so, our operation on the ‘Curse of Ohone-sama’ was carried out one after another.
As each of our operations was successful, students in the school started whispering among themselves, theorizing that the culprit was among the students. However, since there wasn’t any evidence or eye-witness, no one could identify who was responsible for it, nor could they understand their sinister purpose. So in their imagination, the image of the curse grew darker.
When students came to school in the morning and opened their shoe lockers, they would find several bones inside.
Several bones would be found inside someone’s desk in the classroom.
To top it off, they would even find several small bones stuffed inside their resistance bands without them even noticing.
The reaction was as we expected, the boys would get angry and start shouting, making a fuss about who had put them there. And the girls would sometimes burst into tears.
And thus, everyone hated having a ‘bone’ on their desk. Things turned out like this that the ‘bone’ would be treated like the joker in Old Maid.
[T/N: Old Maid is a 19th-century American card game for two or more players, probably deriving from an ancient European gambling game in which the loser pays for the drinks.]
Whenever someone found a bone on their desk, someone would shout “The Curse of Ohone-sama!” and everyone would retreat as if they were fleeing from something filthy. It seemed like a keyword for bullying. So the students began hating the ‘骨’ character even more.
Soon, like the joker in Old Maid, some students would sneak the bone to someone else’s desk if it was found on their desk…. If it was known that a ‘bone’ was found anywhere near them, they would be the victim of terrible bullying. Therefore, whenever someone found a bone in their belongings, they would throw it on someone else’s desk before anyone noticed.
At first, things were only that bad, but gradually it started to have the ominous feeling we expected. If a bone was found on someone’s desk, the person started to feel like some kind of misfortune would befall in their life. Students, who were beginning to worry about their entrance exams, have the tendency to believe in good luck around this time and seemed to particularly detest the appearance of ‘bone’, which was considered a symbol of misfortune, flying into their school.
Before we knew it, a rumor started circling around the school which said throwing a ‘bone’ into someone’s desk would cause a drop in that student’s academic score by 0.1.
We had no idea who started the rumor.
Other rumors, such as not being able to get a girlfriend or getting injured within three days, were naturally created and added to the original effect.
Just as we expected, ‘The Curse of Ohone-sama’ was gradually growing more than what we had originally wanted. It was around this time that I finally realized. In the first place, in junior highschools, or rather the third year of junior highschool, was the perfect time where curses were most likely to take root and grow.
Since the three of us weren’t interested in studying, we didn’t pay any attention to the rumors, however… Even if we had no intention, in a few more months, we would have no choice but to pay attention whether we like it or not. Originally, there was a kind of stagnant pressure in our grade about the big turning point of life, the entrance exam, which we were facing for the first time.
Everyone had the fear of being divided into different groups in the huge class society that is Japan, and everyone subconsciously feared becoming one of the so-called ‘losers’ in that first selection.
Some people studied hard to be free from that fear, while others avoided studying to escape from it.
It was still early spring, so although everyone’s faces were bright and they had a happy smile plastered on their faces, their hearts must have been filled with extreme fear and anxiety.
Perhaps people sought peace from such invisible stagnation in the visible form through the ominous symbol of ‘骨’.
Or Perhaps they wanted to replace the invisible threat of the entrance examination with the visible threat of bones. And they believed that by escaping from ‘bone’, they were escaping from the threat.
It was human nature to avoid things or situations that threaten their peace of mind. And to escape from such situations, they created superstitions, delusions, assumptions, good luck charms, and their own personal beliefs.
Such beliefs may have many names, but… In the end, they were all exactly the same.
In that sense, the time of junior highschool, a time where adolescence and the first turning point in life arrives at the same time, must have been a situation where curses are easily believed, compared to any other stage of life… Obviously, the reason I could analyze it so calmly was because I wasn’t the victim of this ‘curse’. To me, this ominous phenomenon that filled the school with dread was like making them dance in the palm of our hands. From our perspective, their reaction and way of coping was more hilarious than scary…I could have never realized it would turn out more interesting than I thought.
As things were naturally flowing towards the way we wanted, I couldn’t help but start looking forward to the ‘mystery’ part which I had originally planned.
Mystery, which meant… offering money to get rid of the curse.
“If you are cursed, you have to offer money to the Tanuki Shrine.”
When we first mentioned it, no one paid any attention to it at first.
However, as the curse slowly filled the whole school and came to symbolize the gradually crushing pressure before the entrance exams, it began to attract the attention of many students as a means to escape from it.
Just as students are obsessed with talismans for academic success, exam candidates have always been fond of good luck charms. So, putting offerings at shrines in a proper way to escape the curse would have seemed very justified in their eyes. Around this time, the first student appeared and threw a 10 yen coin into the offering box.
It was much less than we expected. At most only two or so students would throw offerings in a week. However, soon the wind of change began to blow and an unexpected event, which we hadn’t expected, occurred.
It was the mayor election of Shikabone city.
When I saw wooden bulletin boards being set up all over the town for the purpose of advertisement, I thought, “Oh, the election is starting again. It’s going to be noisy around this time.”
I thought it would only be a bit noisy….But I never would have expected that it would lead to the true appearance of the ‘Curse of Ohone-sama’.
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