Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Death of the Clerk

Author: Kamifusen

On that day, I was at my part-time job, which was my only source of income. A midnight shift at the convenience store in front of the train station. The actual work that started after 10 pm was quite simple. Aside from, of course, dealing with customers who brought over whatever products they wanted to buy, I mainly just cleaned. The floors, shelves, toilet and a lot of machines. After having done this for a while, it practically became an instinct. The easier tasks could be finished in very little time.

That day was much like any other.

All sound faded away in front of the station as it was past midnight. The only thing you could see was the three colors of the traffic lights and the occasional speeding cars. I had finished some of my cleaning duties and gone out to the parking lot in order to pick up the fallen trash with tongs and collect it in garbage bags. I did this as I wandered around.

What about the store?

No problem. There were no customers. Once it passed 3 AM, hardly anyone would come. At 2 AM there would still be some people who would come to read the new weekly magazines, but it was a Tuesday. There were no magazines with such passionate readers being sold today.

After collecting quite a bit of trash, I straightened my bent back and stretched as I looked up at the sky. That something-triangle-shaped constellation was shining. Today would be sunny… I looked away from the sunless sky to make sure I hadn’t missed any garbage nearby.

And then something caught my eye. It was a person who was standing in the shadow of a telephone pole, the streetlights shining behind him.

Scary…!! Uh, was I just seeing things…?

I quickly looked over my shoulder as I returned to the store. The stranger was gone after the third time I looked. But this only increased my sense of horror even more.

I entered the store and made a beeline for the storage room that was behind a door near the cash register. I sat in front of the security monitor. Then I moved the mouse and viewed the feed of the parking lot in fullscreen. It was quite nice since I had just cleaned it. There wasn’t a speck of garbage.

As I continued to watch the feed during my break, a shadow of a person walking from the parking lot appeared.

I recognized him without the need to squint. It was him. Judging by the direction, he was on a straight course for this store. I switched the screen to show the feed from 4 cameras angles inside of the store; he had indeed come inside. Well, regardless of my personal feelings, a customer was a customer.

“Welcomme. Good eveningg.”

I forced my shaking feet to move as I greeted him. Most people who came at this time were incredibly tired, doing their midnight jobs, and they tended to be irritable. The trick was to use a loose, stretched out greeting instead of an energetic one. But then again, there were people who hated that too. But as far as my own experiences went, those kinds of people would be triggered over anything, and so the looser greetings were overall more effective.

Such were the out-of-place thoughts that ran through my head as I stood there. The intimidating customer had come directly towards the counter after entering. In this case, there were a few patterns that could follow. He was looking for something. He wanted something that was sold at the counter. And,

“Shut up and listen, if you don’t want to die. Take out all the money from the cash register.”

Convenience store robbery.

My mind went blank. I short-circuited. What? What did he say?

“Didn’t you hear me? Take out the money.”

No sound would come out of my throat, as if something was stuck inside. All the fear I had felt was now showing not only through my legs, but it was eating away at my back, arms, hands, and even my brain.

“Ah…um…, what, uh….?”

“Money. Take it all out from the cashier, and the storage room as well. You better hurry if want to avoid being hurt by this guy.”

So saying, the man, who was no customer, showed me his hand. He was holding a very large knife. There would have been less of a sense of reality had he been holding a gun. I might have stopped shaking and erupted into laughter as I patted the man on the shoulder. But this knife was reflecting the ceiling lights so brightly. It looked sharp. I could tell that this was no dream, no prank.

There was nothing I could do. There was no way that I could resist him. I opened the cash register with shaking hands.

Grabbing all of the three types of bills, I quickly offered them to him.

“There should be a safe in the backroom as well. Bring that too.”

But only the manager knew the number for that safe.

“Th-the…manager, alo..ne…knows….”

“Tsk…out of my way.”

The robber pushed me away. The force of the push made me crash into the cigarette shelf. The brand new boxes scattered all over the floor.

The robber entered the storage room and immediately began to violently rummage through shelves and files around the safe, scattering papers all over the ground as he looked. He was probably trying to find documents with the number. I watched from the cashier among the mess of cigarettes.

I doubted he had much time. There was a murderous look in his eyes as he turned around and then started to walk towards me. No, no, no!

“You little shit…I’ve had enough. You are no use to me now. Die.”

At that moment, I had no idea what was happening. The first thing I noticed was heat. My stomach was hot as if it were burning. My vision showed a world of colors that was neither black nor white, before turning into the face of the robber, who stood in front of me. There was an intense rage in his eyes as he let out a vulgar laugh. I shook, and slowly lowered my gaze.

The source of the heat I had felt was a knife sticking out of me.

“Ah…ggg-a….no…this can’t…”

“It is. You’ll die for seeing my face.”

My uniform turned red with blood. I looked up again. The smile disappeared from the man’s face as he raised his foot and began to kick me.

“Gaah!!”

I reflexively cried out. This bastard…he was kicking the handgrip of the knife…

There was nothing I could do but crumple on the floor. My arm had caught onto the shelf, scattering even more cigarettes.

“Tsk… You’re in the way.”

The man stepped on me as if I was part of the floor and fled to the front of the counter. I had no strength to go after him. I lay, covered in cigarettes as I slowly moved my arm and touched the handle of the knife. Slowly, my hand lowered to my stomach, but I could not feel the hilt. Apparently, it had entered my stomach along with the blade.

Well then…there was no hope for me…

A feeling much like resignation took over my body. There was no going back from this state. I could not feel like doing anything anymore.

My eyelids slowly closed as I surrendered. My vision turned black.

Ahh…so, so this would be my end… I had paid good money to attend a professional school, but no matter how hard I tried, I could not get hired. And I had to work this part-time job to survive. I would sleep in the afternoon and live out these days trying to pay for my scholarship. It was pathetic… I had thought, I had thought that I would do so many other things… So many things, the list was endless.

I thought, my life would be so much better…

My consciousness slowly grew hazier. The sensations in my limbs, the heat that had burned so much was now gone.

And at that moment before death, I heard one final voice.

“Confirmation of a subject who wishes to be summoned. Unique Skill ‘Jack of all Trades and Master of None’ granted.”

What was that…? Did someone just say something incredibly rude to me…?

Ahh…no, I was done…my consciousness…

Someone…