Afterword

Western or Japanese, I love horror films. The simpler the setting, the better. I totally clear my mind and stuff my mouth with popcorn as I watch the characters onscreen run from murderers and evil spirits with trepidation and excitement. It’s pure bliss. But fear is like your sense of smell—the more you’re exposed to a stimulus, the duller it becomes. Simply eerie works become not enough. We seek more and more stimulation until we feel the greatest fear from things that are one step away from belonging in a gag movie and go, “What the heck?” Human feelings are truly a mystery.

The computer game Ao Oni created by noprops is exactly that kind of “one step away from comedy” work, and that is why it’s so scary. When I was asked to do the novelization, I jumped on it, but the truth is I was unsure how to capture this kind of fear in words. Karin Suzuragi, who handled the illustrations, was a huge help and I feel like we were able to somehow replicate the terror of the game, but... What do you think? The novel of Ao Oni is based on the 3.0 patch, but is an original story and adds two new characters. That said, I tried to make it my own while still keeping with the game’s aesthetic. The meaning of which... I hope you’ll understand if you read to the end. For those whose first experience with Ao Oni is on a bookshelf, I implore you to try the game, which takes place from Hiroshi’s point of view. There’s nothing wrong with expanding your Ao Oni horizons.

But in true horror movie fashion—think Damian, Jason, Jigsaw, Sadako—the monsters always power up in the sequels to give people a second scare. There are still many mysteries left in Ao Oni, and there are a lot of iconic scenes I couldn’t fit in this novel. If I have the opportunity, I’d like to write new adventures with Shun, Hiroshi, and the rest of the gang.

So here’s to hoping we meet again.

Kenji Kuroda