Osamu Dazai's Entrance Exam Read online

  I land a roundhouse kick to the back of Dazai’s head, knocking him against the wall and rendering him unconscious.

  It was only four days ago when this failure of a human being became my colleague.

  “A new employee?”

  That day, I had been filing some paperwork when the president called me into his office.

  He told me they had hired a new investigator, so he wanted me to look after him.

  It was unexpected. Admittedly, the Armed Detective Agency profits from violence and deals with life-threatening work, but I’ve never heard anything about being short on staff. I’m even able to hold a second job working as an algebra instructor at Shin-Tsuruya Institute twice a week.

  Granted, there has been an increase in cases that require armed personnel, such as the “Azure Banner Terrorist,” the “Serial Disappearances of Yokohama Visitors,” and our feud with the underground organization known as the Port Mafia. Honestly, we’ve been getting so many dangerous job offers of late that even our top detective, Ranpo, would have a hard time covering them all on his own. Perhaps the president hired a new employee in anticipation of that.

  “Let me introduce you. Come in.”

  The president faces the door after a few moments of contemplation and calls out to someone.

  “Good afternoon.”

  A man smiles from ear to ear as he enters the room.

  He’s wearing a sand-colored coat and an open-collared shirt. He’s tall and thin with disheveled black hair, and while his unkempt appearance leaves much to be desired, he has somewhat handsome features. I am slightly curious about the white bandages wrapped around his neck and wrists, though.

  “I’m Osamu Dazai, twenty years old. Nice to meet you.”

  Twenty, huh? He’s the same age as me.

  “I’m Kunikida. If there’s anything you don’t understand, I’m here to help.”

  “Oh, so you’re a detective at the legendary Armed Detective Agency! It’s an honor to meet you!”

  He forcefully grabs my hand and shakes it in an exaggerated manner.

  In that moment, I suddenly sense a cold, piercing light in his eyes, as if he were calmly evaluating his senior—no, as if he were staring into my very soul through the eyes of a heavenly, enlightened sage. However, it is only for a fleeting moment before his vacant expression returns. Was I seeing things? Could my mind have been playing tricks on me? I pull myself together.

  “So, Dazai, what brings you to our detective agency? This kind of place won’t take in just anyone who asks.”

  “Yes, about that. I was at this pub—bored, unemployed—drunkenly complaining to myself when I happened to hit it off with some old guy sitting next to me. He said he’d give me a job if I beat him in a drinking contest. And, well, I jokingly went along with it but ended up winning.”

  Who is this “old guy”?

  “It was Chief Taneda of the Special Division for Unusual Powers. He came by yesterday and gave me the news,” the president says with a straight face.

  I find myself speechless when I hear him mention Chief Taneda’s name so casually. Chief Taneda is the top brass in the Home Affairs Ministry’s Special Division for Unusual Powers, a secret military agency unknown to the general public. His job is to control and regulate information on skill users. I’ve even heard he provided support to our president in establishing the Armed Detective Agency. That’s why not even the president himself can refuse such a referral.

  “I really hope we can get along, Kunikida.”

  Our new hire gives me a toothy smile, perhaps oblivious of my internal apprehension.

  However, being personally recommended by a prominent figure doesn’t make you any less of a nuisance when you’re tripping on mushrooms this early in the morning.

  Today marks three days since I was paired with Dazai.

  I’m mentally exhausted, almost no work is getting done, and we’re receiving more complaints by the day. If I take my eyes off him for even a second, he’ll either leap into a river and claim he was trying to drown himself; get blackout drunk at a pub after what he calls a “pick-me-up”; or chat up some pretty lady, saying he had a divine revelation. He’s a twenty-year-old self-centered man-child who throws a wrench in my schedule every chance he gets.

  Having said that, work is work, and coworkers are coworkers. Admitting defeat after only three days would damage not only the president’s trust in me but my dignity as a detective as well.

  “How’s the newcomer?” the president asks while we play Go in a small tatami room near the office.

  “A disaster. Imagine the devil, a poltergeist, and the god of poverty all combined into one entity.”

  I place a black Go piece on the cypress board with the distinctive click of rock sliding over wood.

  “But it’s nothing I can’t handle.”

  The president and I always play Go at the same place after work. He sits up straight, facing me from across the board in the empty room.

  “I appreciate it.”

  He then places a white Go piece on the board, pushing me into an unfavorable position.

  “It’s nothing. After all, this is what Chief Taneda wanted. But…why would he send a man like that to our agency?” I ask while contemplating my next move.

  Should I go for the white territory in the bottom right corner? …I shouldn’t. I’m having a hard enough time making an approach move as it is. But if I try to hold out on the left side, it’s only a matter of time before he takes the center and the game is over. There’s nothing I can do. It looks like it’s going to be a while before I’m a match for him.

  “Chief Taneda may be a free-spirited individual, but he has a discerning eye when it comes to remarkable talent. He must have sensed something unique in that boy.”

  I have heard rumors about his extraordinary judgment. After all, he wouldn’t be the leader of the Home Affairs Ministry’s Special Division for Unusual Powers if he didn’t. But “remarkable talent”? You could shine a light in Dazai’s left ear and see it come out the right.

  “And I agree with Chief Taneda’s decision. Osamu Dazai passed the written and field tests with perfect scores. He is extremely capable—dangerously so, even.”

  “…What do you mean?”

  “We looked into his past but found nothing. It’s completely blank. I asked a close friend in the military’s intelligence department to check, but he couldn’t find a single thing. Rather eerie, I must say. It’s as if someone very carefully wiped his background clean.”

  It is rather odd that even the military’s intelligence department couldn’t find anything.

  “Maybe all he did was loaf around the house for the past twenty years?”

  “Perhaps. Because otherwise…”

  He frowns even deeper than usual before continuing.

  “Have you heard about his skill?”

  “Not yet.”

  I heard he was a skill user, but I didn’t get the chance to ask about it.

  “He can nullify any skill simply through physical contact.”

  I thought I was hearing things. Nullify skills on contact? At a glance, it may seem like nothing special, but it’s extremely rare. If properly utilized, it could be used to defeat an entire organization of skill users. My skill, The Matchless Poet, allows me to materialize objects just by writing them in my notebook, ripping out the page, and willing them into existence. However, I cannot produce items larger than the notebook itself. While it’s versatile and highly valuable, it doesn’t quite exceed the realm of convenience. That’s because if I really needed something, I could simply bring it with me before I went out.

  But Dazai’s skill is different. In theory, there are countless enemies only he can defeat. Even the strongest skill user in the world is nothing more than an ordinary person before him. It would be no surprise if organizations from all over the world gathered to recruit him. I’m slowly starting to get what the president is trying to say.

  “So…let me get this straig
ht. At some pub, a tremendously important man like Chief Taneda just happens to sit next to a genius skill user, and they just happen to hit it off. Then this oddball happens to be sharp and gets a perfect score on his tests, but he also just happens to currently not have a job. Then, just like that, he successfully joins the prohibitively selective Armed Detective Agency without any trouble at all… Are you implying this is all a little too convenient?”

  “Perhaps I am overthinking things, but the Armed Detective Agency has numerous connections with government agencies and military personnel. We also handle a large amount of classified information due to the nature of our work.”

  It would make sense for a member of a criminal organization to infiltrate a detective agency due to their close ties to the police. There are plenty of advantages in joining a detective agency, given how easy some are to get into. But Dazai, a spy? And one good enough to outwit someone as distinguished as Chief Taneda? That Dazai?

  “Kunikida, I want you to carry out his entrance exam.”

  I nod. The agency’s “entrance exam” is a task assigned to detectives to give to prospective employees. It’s the real test, so to speak, and you will not be recognized as an actual employee if you don’t pass.

  “I would like you to bring Dazai with you while you work and see if he can be trusted. If you ever feel he could be an emissary, intelligence operative, or spy of some sort, then you are to fire him without hesitation. However, if you sense any signs of wickedness in his heart…”

  The president takes a black automatic pistol out from a bag behind him, then presents it to me.

  “…”

  I accept the gun without a word. It’s heavy.

  “Shoot him.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  If Dazai is part of some sinister scheme, then it would be the agency’s duty to stop him before things got out of hand. The Armed Detective Agency’s licensed staff are granted police-like authority. We’re authorized to carry guns and knives under certain conditions, and we can even pull records from police organizations. But above all, it allows us to commit unethical acts if we wish to do so: meddle with said authorities’ investigations, falsify police information, and even wiretap or secretly film key facilities. At worst, one could even commit an act of terrorism and sabotage these major facilities, resulting in the deaths of hundreds—if not thousands of individuals.

  The cold iron pistol sits motionless in my hand.

  Rippling waves roll over the bay beneath a shower of moonlight as I walk through the crowd by the Port of Yokohama. The sound of the ocean struggles to be heard over the hustle and bustle of the evening, while the moon competes with the city lights. Dazai slowly bobs down the street behind me.

  We’re finally able to start work after he wasted half a day with the whole mushroom fiasco.

  “Hey, show me that skill of yours again. The Matchless Poet, was it?”

  “No. One doesn’t so casually reveal his skill. Besides, I have to tear a page out of my notebook every time I use it. The artisan who makes these notebooks produces only a hundred of them a year, and they’re not cheap. Do you really think I’m going to waste a page just to entertain you?”

  I check my watch before looking back at him.

  “Anyway, Dazai, you need to walk a little faster. We’re going to be late.”

  “What do you mean, late? I thought we didn’t set a specific time to meet up with the informant?”

  “No, I told them over the phone that we’d be there around seven PM.”

  “Well, it’s exactly seven now, and they’re only about five minutes from here, so we won’t be late.”

  “That means we’re already late, you idiot! According to my watch, ‘around seven PM’ refers to the twenty seconds between 18:59:50 and 19:00:10!”

  “You’re the only one with a watch like that, Kunikida…,” Dazai mumbles as he walks.

  Incidentally, my watch uses specialized equipment to set itself to standard time every morning when I wake up, so the margin of error is always under one second.

  “We would’ve been done with most of our work today if a certain someone hadn’t eaten a magic mushroom. Don’t you dare eat one of those again. And if you do, make sure it’s the fatal kind.”

  “Ah, what a pleasurable experience that was.”

  “You’re fine now, right? Still seeing pink elephants in the sky?”

  “Elephants? Don’t be silly—elephants can’t fly. Those were purple elephant beetles I was seeing.”

  There’s no hope for this guy. The more I talk to him, the more foolish I feel for ever having doubts about him. A spy? Wickedness in his heart? The worst he could do is jump in front of a train and screw up the rail schedule. At any rate, if Dazai does end up being nothing more than an incompetent fool, then the solution is simple. I just have to get rid of him, which I would be more than happy to do. But—

  “Dazai, you remember our mission, right?”

  “Exterminating the purple elephant beetles.”

  “…You know, I kind of get the feeling you’re doing this on purpose.”

  “Ah-ha-ha. I kid. We’re going to investigate a haunted mansion, right?”

  His smiling face and casual demeanor cause me to scowl.

  Yesterday, I received an e-mail with a request from a client. The message said the following:

  Dear Sir,

  I hope everyone at the Armed Detective Agency is doing well. I am contacting you in hopes of asking you a favor. I understand that you are very busy. However, I was left with no other choice.

  To tell the truth, I would like you to investigate a certain building. It should be completely uninhabited, yet night after night, I hear eerie groaning and whispering coming from within, and I see a faint light flickering through the window. The other neighboring residents and I are so terribly frightened, we can hardly sleep.

  I understand that this is not a small request, but I would be forever in your debt if you could check to see whether this is some sort of prank. Moreover, if this does happen to be a prank, then I would appreciate it if you could explain how and why it is occurring.

  While it is not much, I sent you a retainer fee for your services, so please have a look at your earliest convenience. Furthermore, I ask that this request remain a secret between us. Thank you for your understanding.

  I wish everyone good health and the best of luck.

  Yours sincerely.

  It’s a rather long-winded request, but its sender is essentially asking us to check out a building in their neighborhood to see what all the strange noises are. Almost immediately after this e-mail arrived, the agency received a letter in the mail containing the retainer fee. I verified the amount to find that it was twice the market rate even after subtracting the planned expenses, which gave us no reason to refuse. We will conduct our business as per usual.

  There is one thing I’m worried about, though: The client didn’t leave a name. It is not clear who they are, where they live, or even how to get in touch with them. Perhaps that was intentional, but we won’t be able to report our findings if we cannot contact them. Thus, we have no choice but to search for the client first.

  “What if the client’s some kind of vengeful spirit? Perhaps they’ve tricked us into coming to this haunted mansion to eat us, and—”

  “You fool. What kind of ghost story involves vengeful spirits writing e-mails?”

  And I wouldn’t be afraid if it ended up being a ghost anyway.

  As we continue our idle banter, we end up heading to the warehouses at the port. The moonlight reflects off the brick warehouses, dimly illuminating the cluster of buildings under the blanket of night. We step foot into an old warehouse that’s a size smaller than the rest. The ceiling is high, and the plaster on the walls is peeling due to the ocean breeze. My nose is tickled by the smell of iron machine parts and oil along with the old scent of dust and the passage of time. I ring the office doorbell. There’s a creaking sound as if iron is sliding against iron,
and the electronic lock clicks open.

  “C’mon in.”

  Sure enough, a high-pitched voice welcomes us inside. We pass through a few heavy birch doors that have been unlocked remotely before arriving at our destination.

  The room is just shy of 380 square feet. Machinery and electronics run across the floor and up the walls, the blinking diodes illuminating the dusky room. In the center stands a collection of computers with fans whirring like growling wolves. There are four LCD panels on the desk, each emitting a pale-blue light.

  “Heya, Four-Eyes. Still religiously following that little notebook of yours?”

  “Is that really the tone you want to take with me, informant? If we hand over the evidence we have on you, like we should, you’d be looking at ten years in prison. And that would break your late father’s heart.”

  “Don’t you dare bring my dad into this.”

  The informant, a fourteen-year-old boy, stacks his legs on the desk before leaning back in his chair. Cropped hair, big eyes, always wears the same white sweater no matter the season. He may be small, but his vision is sharp enough to cut glass.

  “Anyway, it’s not like you to be late. What, were you on a ‘date’ or somethin’?”

  He makes a circle with one hand and shoves a finger in it with the other.

  “Sorry to disappoint, but I only plan on going on dates with the woman I marry. And according to the ‘Future Plans’ page in my notebook,” I reply as I turn to the appropriate page, “it’s going to be another six years before I get married.”

  “Hold up. You already got a girl you’re gonna marry?”

  “Not for another four years.”

  “Uh-huh…”

  The boy’s eyes fly open, and his jaw drops when he realizes I’m serious.

  “Take a good look, lad. I live according to my ideals and schedule. That’s what it means to be an adult.”

  “Yeah… I’ve got a pretty good idea what kinda person you are, but that was…uh, something.”