Zero Dimension Hill

STORY

This is a mysterious short story featuring metempsychosis.

Toshio Yamaoka, a nine-year-old elementary school boy, always begins to cry while listening to a record of "The Swan of Tuonela " conducted by Verne, a world-renowned conductor. He claims that he sees a large tree and a white wall that remind him of his hometown, which is not. Upon hearing this, Toshio’s older brother searches for the source of this mysterious phenomenon and discovers that it originates from a village called Rienta in Vietnam. Additionally, four other nine-year-old children from various parts of the world have had similar experiences. Soon, all these children, including Toshio, are brought together in Rienta to investigate the cause of their shared visions. Eventually, the astonishing cause is revealed all at once.

This short story is a perfect model with a well-composed organization. The readers, wrapped in strange phenomena in the first half, are satisfied in the last half as all the mysteries, including foreshadowing, are perfectly cleared.