It’s definitely not a lewish conspiracy, nor a CIA conspiracy, and— obvious as this may be—it’s not an alien conspiracy. Before all else, one needs to keep this fact firmly in mind while living one’s life.

Even so…

A tiny percentage of people actually have stumbled upon a real conspiracy. There is, in fact, one person who witnessed with his own eyes a conspiracy that exists, at this very moment, in the most extreme secrecy.

Who is this person?

It’s me.

Chapter 01.
Birth of a Soldier

Part One

On a cold, cold January night, I learned about the existence of a conspiracy.

In my tiny six-mat,[1] one-room apartment, I had ensconced myself next to my kotatsu stove.[2] It was a painfully dreary night.

Despite it being a new millennium, there was no hope in sight. I even cried while eating my New Year’s soup.[3]

For an unemployed, twenty-two-year-old, male college dropout, the winter chill was piercing. In the middle of my filthy room, where thrown-off clothing littered the floor and the smell of cigarette smoke had soaked into the walls, I sighed over and over.

How could things have come to this?

It was all I could think about.

“Ah,” I moaned.

If I didn’t break out of my present condition soon, I would fall behind completely and disappear from normal society. Even worse, I was a college dropout already. I needed to find work fast and return to society.

I just… couldn’t do it.

Why? What was the reason?

The answer is simple: Because I am a hikikomori.[4]

Currently, the hottest, most popular new social phenomenon— hikikomori. That’s me. A recluse.

They say that there are now approximately two million hikikomori living in |apan. Two million is a tremendous number. If someone threw a rock on the street, they would hit a hikikomori… Of course, that wouldn’t really happen. Hikikomori don’t go outside, after all.

Anyway, I was one of the hikikomori currently so popular here in Japan. Not to mention that I was somewhat of a veteran hikikomori. I left my apartment only once a week, and then I’d just to go to a convenience store for food and cigarettes. My friends numbered zero, and I slept sixteen hours a day.

This year would mark four full years of living as a hikikomori. My lifestyle had caused me to drop out of college.

Seriously, I was such a frightful hikikomori that I should have been approaching professional status. No matter whom I might be up against, I really doubted I’d lose easily to other hikikomori.