That was... a truly strange experience.

This happened nearly twenty years ago. Back when I was a student, the first place I picked to live on my own was a nearly thirty-year-old, one-bedroom apartment. I’d naïvely chosen it thinking, "As long as it's cheap and I have a place to sleep, whatever." But after moving in, I realized that while I could bring male friends over to a place like that, there was no way I could invite a girl. Well, not that I had a girlfriend back then anyway.

I recall having to unexpectedly move out of that apartment—with its worn tatami mats and sliding doors that practically screamed the Showa era—around the end of my freshman year. The landlord died suddenly. To be honest, it wasn't much of an apartment, but because it was in a decent residential neighborhood not far from the station, I heard through the grapevine that a feud broke out over the inheritance. (Eventually, it was torn down and turned into a parking lot.)

As I searched for a new place, a real estate agent pitched me a dirt-cheap property. It was another run-down building, about fifty years old. A company warehouse and an old-fashioned hair salon occupied the first floor, while the entire second floor was available as living space. It was huge, only a ten-minute walk from the station, and best of all, the rent was practically the same as my old place. With conditions that good, I scheduled a viewing right away.

Accompanied by the agent, I toured the property. Located on a street near the station, it certainly looked old from the outside, but not terribly so. Just as I’d been told, the first floor housed the dated salon and company warehouse, and an exterior flight of stairs led up to the second floor. At the top of the stairs was another set leading to the roof, with the apartment entrance right in front of them. Opening the front door revealed an inner door, with a toilet tucked in the space between them.

Feeling a little excited, I opened the inner door, only to be overwhelmed by a vast, totally empty space. The entire second floor was just one massive, open room.

"What do you think? Spacious, isn't it?"

At the agent's words, I replied:

"Uh, yeah... but this is way too much space for one person."

The lack of partitions wasn't the only thing that felt bizarre about the space. The floor was covered in a deep purple carpet—picture the robes worn by a certain infamous cult leader, and you get the idea. When I asked, the agent explained that a new religious group had previously used the floor as a training hall, which accounted for its appearance. (For the record, it wasn't the cult responsible for that notorious incident.)

"Don't worry, the landlord is paying to renovate the space," the agent reassured me.

He mentioned the renovation casually, but hearing that they were going to build partition walls to create a room and even install a bathroom made a suspicion pop into my head.

"Offering terms this good... is this a stigmatized property? Did someone die here?"

When I asked that, the agent answered without batting an eye.

"Nothing like that. It's just that between the building's age and the fact that a religious group used it, it's been sitting vacant for a long time. The owner just wants someone to live here, so they're willing to offer these terms."

Normally, a person would hesitate, but since I had to vacate my previous place quickly, I took it on the spot. Which, as it turned out, led directly to what happened later.

A month later, the quick renovation was finished, and the place looked passable. That said, the giant room had simply been divided in two by a crudely constructed wall down the middle. Each area was still far too big to really be called a room, but it was still much better than before. The only thing that bothered me was that the deep purple carpet remained completely untouched.

Still, I was secretly thrilled by having more space than I knew what to do with. Brainstorming what kind of furniture to buy was fun, but best of all, the layout was practically like having a whole house to myself. Since the hair salon downstairs closed in the evening, I could blast my guitar or play video games all night without anyone complaining. I was excited to start living such a carefree life.

However, strange things started happening right after I moved in. In the middle of the night, loud tapping noises would echo through the room. At first, I assumed it was just an old building settling. But instead of creaking wood, the sound was distinctly like someone clapping their hands, echoing from various spots around the room. And it wasn't just once or twice a night, either. You’d think a phenomenon like that would drive me crazy, but apparently I wasn't that sensitive. I paid it no mind and slept right through it before I knew it.

After a string of such nights, a friend came over to visit. We partied late into the night to celebrate my move, and since he missed the last train, he decided to crash at my place. I mentioned the tapping noises to him, but being a skeptic, he didn't believe me. However, as soon as we turned off the lights, the noises started up right on cue, leaving him thoroughly spooked.

He kept visiting occasionally after that. Late one night, I left him alone in the apartment to run to the nearest convenience store for supplies. When I got back, he was visibly terrified and raised his voice at me.

"Just now, something slammed against the inside of that cardboard box you're using as a TV stand!"

According to him, the cardboard box from the CRT TV I’d bought—which was sitting alone in the middle of the newly moved-in room and serving as a makeshift stand—had suddenly been pounded on from the inside. Terrified, the two of us cautiously peered inside, but naturally, there was nobody there. That incident shook my friend up pretty badly, and he urged me to move out, but I brushed off his suggestion, saying it wasn't doing any actual harm.

From that day on, though, the strange occurrences escalated. The tapping noises grew louder and more intense, the TV would turn itself on after I’d switched it off, voices whispered when no one was around, and items I’d put down would vanish. The voices were creepy, sure, but since they were usually just a brief "Hey" or a word or two, I treated them as an extension of the tapping noises and didn't worry much. Things disappearing was mildly annoying, but then again, I was messy, so I couldn't say for sure it was paranormal.

Then, about a week after the cardboard box incident, I had a strange dream.

In the dream, I was standing in a barren, dry field with nothing around. A gravel path stretched straight ahead into the distance, and I walked down it endlessly. After walking a while, I saw an old, single-story house off to my front right. It was a shack-like building with a red corrugated tin roof surrounded by a crumbling cinderblock wall, and a bald man in his sixties or seventies stood at the entrance. He placed his hand on the front door, preparing to step inside. I stood a short distance away, watching him quietly. Then, the man shifted his gaze to me and spoke.

"...I'll be back on Friday the [blank]th." (*The date was unclear.)

With those words, I snapped awake. My heart was pounding like I’d just had a nightmare, and heavy beads of sweat poured from my forehead.

"What a creepy dream."

As I lay there with an unsettling taste in my mouth, I suddenly felt the presence of someone standing right by my pillow. Chinese burglary rings were making the news back then, so I panicked, thinking one had broken into my run-down place. The presence stood motionless at my bedside. Figuring it was best not to provoke them and just fake sleep until they left, I held my breath and stayed still. The eerie presence moved past my left side and walked toward the door at the foot of my bed. (Thinking back on it calmly now, there wasn't a single footstep.)

"Whew, I made it through without them noticing."

I breathed a sigh of relief, but the presence stopped dead at my feet and didn't move an inch. Did they realize I was pretending? Anxiety gripped me, and just as I opened my eyes a crack to see who was there, sleep paralysis struck.

An overwhelming force squeezed my body from both sides, pinning me completely. A mechanical hum—vroom... vroom...—echoed inside my head. Terrified and unable to squeeze out a single sound, I started reciting random Buddhist chants in my head, praying for anyone to save me, when...

"Hey, you in there?"

I heard my friend's voice. The moment I heard it, the paralysis instantly dissolved. I scrambled to the entrance and pulled the door open. Standing there was my friend, dead drunk.

"Sorry for coming so late, man. I came to return that game I borrowed~"

Apparently, while cleaning his room, he found a game he’d borrowed from me ages ago and hopped on a train to return it before he forgot again. He’d intended to come straight to my place, but stopped at a girls' bar near the station for a quick drink and completely lost track of time. It was a ridiculous story, but thanks to him, I was saved from the terror of that paralysis.

From that night on, sleep paralysis hit me almost every single day. Day or night... didn't matter. As it happened day after day, I began to sense the exact moment it was about to strike. Just as I was wondering why on earth this kept happening, I was hit with unexplained bouts of severe dizziness. One night, I laid down on my futon and my vision started spinning out of control. Many people have tried spinning around a baseball bat before attempting watermelon splitting—that intense head-spinning sensation just wouldn't stop. At first, I assumed it would be gone by morning, but it persisted for days. The severity fluctuated, but the spinning sensation was virtually constant. Fearing I had a brain disorder, I got a thorough examination at a major hospital, but they found no cause whatsoever.

After months of enduring these bizarre occurrences, whenever I told anyone about it, they'd invariably say:

"Maybe whatever's there is trying to drive you out?"

Looking back, that made sense. The relentless, almost harassment-like phenomena could well have been an attempt to force me out. But I had my reasons for staying. My parents repeatedly warned me to get out of such a dangerous place, but my main reason was simple: moving was too much of a hassle. Plus, I think I was being stubborn. I assumed whatever it was would give up eventually, so I carried on with my life. And that's when I arrived at *that* experience.

The event I'm about to describe marked the end of the major paranormal occurrences. Even now, though, I can't say for sure whether it actually happened or if it was just a dream. Please keep that in mind as you read on.

It happened while I was taking an afternoon nap. I was dreaming, and it was a continuation of the dream with the bald man. Glaring intensely at me, the man entered the house without a word. I just stood there, watching him. That was when I remembered what he had said in the previous dream:

"...I'll be back on Friday the [blank]th."

I had no idea why he would say such a thing to me. I didn't even recognize the bald man in the first place. As I walked along with those thoughts, I found myself standing right beside the house. Up close, it looked even more dilapidated. Paint was peeling off the roof everywhere, the sliding front door was crooked, and windowpanes were shattered. Thinking about how the man lived in a place that looked like a deserted ruin made me feel strangely sorry for him. Just as I tried to pass by the house, someone grabbed my arm. I turned around and saw the bald man gripping my arm with a terrifying look on his face. I remember clearly that his expression was so consumed with hatred and fury, it didn't seem of this world.

I bolted awake. Gripped by an unnamable terror, my heart was pounding wildly just like before. My breathing was ragged, and as I tried to take a deep breath to calm down, I realized something. Was it an instinctive realization?

"My heart is stopping."

To this day, I don't know why, but I suddenly just understood it to be true. I took a deep breath and began pounding hard on my chest. Over and over and over and over, I beat against my own chest. But it was useless; a growing suffocation took hold. I couldn't breathe properly. As my breath thinned out, I felt my heartbeat growing faint and weak.

"Ah, this is it. I'm dying."

Thump... thump......... thump. I can still feel the sensation of that last, faint pulse even today.

When I regained consciousness, I was standing halfway up a flight of stone steps shrouded in light mist. Looking around the deserted surroundings, I saw a desolate hot spring town at the top of the stairs, while the steps below stretched down endlessly. As I hesitated over which way to go, I noticed a side path right next to me.

Curious about the side path, I followed it and emerged onto a mountain trail—or perhaps a forest road—surrounded by an endless grove of pine trees. The scenery was washed in sepia, completely devoid of color. I walked aimlessly through the landscape, which felt like a monochrome photograph. I just kept straight along the road, unsure where it led. Suddenly, looking through the gap in the pine trees on my right, I noticed a massive lake. Thick clouds covered the sky, but through breaks in the cloud cover, several pillars of light shone down onto the surface of the water. My eyes and mind were completely captivated by the divine, breathtaking beauty of the scene.

"I have to see that up close."

Driven by that irresistible urge, I quickened my pace. Glancing at the view through the trees as I walked, I came to a fork in the road. A path to the right led toward the lake. At the junction stood a tall wooden sign, taller than a person, made from a single thick board. On it, written by hand in red ink, was:

"To Lake Ashiya"

That was what was written in red handwritten lettering. I still remember how, despite everything else being sepia, those characters were a vivid, blood red.

Allow me to clarify one point: in Hakone, Kanagawa Prefecture, there is a lake called Lake Ashi (Ashinoko). However, there is no such lake as "Lake Ashiya" (Ashiyako). Furthermore, I am not a resident of Kanagawa Prefecture. I have no ties to Hakone and had never visited the area in my life.

Getting back to the story—I turned at the fork and pressed onward. My only thought was to reach the shores of that lake as quickly as humanly possible. After walking for a while, I spotted a small store.

To the left of the shop, which looked like an old Showa-era candy store, stood another wooden sign just like the one at the fork.

The shop's entrance was a sliding glass door, giving a clear view of the interior. There was no sign of anyone inside. Beyond the glass door lay a spacious earthen entryway; straight ahead behind it was a Japanese-style tatami room, and to the right was a room with a noren curtain hanging in the doorway. In the back left was a service door, standing open, with a path extending beyond it. The lake was visible along that path. Unable to contain my impatience, I slid the shop door open.

"Excuse me, is anyone here?"

Opening the sliding door, I called out to the shopkeeper. But there was no reply. I took a step inside. I waited and looked around, but still felt no sign of any human presence.

"Hello? Anyone home?"

I called out louder than before, but received no answer.

"This is frustrating... I want to get to the lake as soon as possible..."

Thinking that, I waited for the shopkeeper to appear. In the tatami room, a set of futons was neatly folded, indicating that the house wasn't abandoned. Did that mean someone had just stepped out for a moment? I stood waiting for their return, but there was only silence. No matter how long I waited, nobody showed up.

"I know it's bad to go through without permission, but I'm just going to go ahead."

Gazing at the back service door, I made up my mind and was about to step up into the tatami room when it happened.

"Can I help you with something?"

Where had she come from? A hunchbacked old woman with her hands clasped behind her back was glaring at me,

standing right in front of the noren curtain.

"Um, I want to go to the lake just past here."

Startled for a moment, I explained that I wanted to pass through. The old woman paused for a breath before speaking again.

"You can't go through there."

For a second, I didn't understand what she meant, assuming I had to pay a fee to proceed. Thinking that if I paid whatever was required she'd let me pass, I fumbled through my jeans pockets, but to my dismay, my wallet wasn't there.

As I flustered about, the old woman didn't utter a word. Then, I heard several voices behind me. Turning around, I saw three women in their fifties or sixties chatting amicably as they walked toward us.

"Welcome,"

The old woman greeted the trio with an attitude completely different from how she’d treated me. After chatting briefly with them, she ushered all three inside without any fuss. The three women walked through the tatami room, stepped out the back exit, and continued down the path beyond.

I watched the scene in dumbfounded shock, frozen in place. Just as I was growing indignant at the double standard, the old woman, having seen the three off, walked over to me and spoke.

"Do you really want to go down that path? I won't stop you from going, but if you do, you won't be able to come back, you know."

"What do you mean by that?"

The old woman gave no answer. But unlike before, her face now bore a compassionate, Buddha-like expression. Seeing that look, I understood everything.

"I must not go any further."

I bowed silently and turned to leave. When I chanced a glance back, the old woman was standing there, watching me quietly.

And then I woke up. Upon regaining consciousness, the first thing I checked was my heartbeat. Placing my hand on my chest, I felt a steady, strong pulse. Drenched in sweat, the rhythm of my heart filled me with the overwhelming realization that I was alive. Only then was I finally able to breathe a sigh of relief.

The tapping noises and sleep paralysis continued for a while after that, but after about six months of living there, the paranormal events gradually tapered off until they stopped entirely. All told, I ended up living in that room for about ten years, but the strange phenomena were confined to those first six months or so.

The building has since been demolished and replaced with a new structure. Even though I've moved away from the area, I occasionally stop by on personal business, and whenever I see the new building, those events come rushing back.

As I mentioned at the beginning, I still don't know whether this near-death experience (?) was real or just a dream. But when I think that if I had walked past that shop back then, I might not be in this world today, a cold chill runs down my spine.

It's been a long story, but this is my real experience.

Oh, and one last thing... Here is a story from when I handed over the keys in the presence of the building contractor.

As they were inspecting various parts of the room, one of the workers called out to me.

"Did you do something with the ceiling inspection hatch?"

he asked. When I told him I had no idea what he meant, he climbed a stepladder and took a few photos with a digital camera. He showed them to me: inside the ceiling hatch was a small, altar-like structure. Sitting on it was an old traditional Japanese doll, facing directly toward us. I couldn't help letting out a soft gasp. Looking back now, I can't help feeling it was somehow connected to that whole series of strange phenomena... And that is my story.