Fifth person: Urabe Motonobu

Even though it was July, the rainy season still lingered. I loosened my tie and wiped the sweat from my neck with a handkerchief. The inside of my company car was filled with humidity. While stopped at a red light, I asked a question to my junior colleague sitting in the driver's seat.

"Shinoda"

"What is it?"

"When are you going to fix that honorific language?"

It was only last month that he was appointed to train the new employees. Right after completing his training, Shinoda was using very formal honorific language, but recently he had lost all sense of nervousness. Without realizing it, he had dyed his hair a little brown.

"Is my honorific language strange?"

Shinoda doesn't even glance at the passenger seat, although it would be annoying if he kept looking elsewhere.

"That's weird. Um, what's that about? Stop it."

"Am I saying that?"

Shinoda didn't seem to be aware of it at all. He gave up and leaned back in the passenger seat. The light turned green and the company car slowly started moving. One after another, cars behind passed the company car, which was traveling on the left side of the two-lane road.

When I was a new employee, if I drove like this, my seniors would yell at me. They'd say, "What are you doing driving so slowly?" But they don't give me that kind of lecture. If they did, Shinoda would be depressed. New employees these days are sensitive.

"Urabe-san"

"what up?"

I was afraid of what he would say next, but what Shinoda said next was unexpected.

"Urabe-san, did you play any sports?"

Perhaps this question was Shinoda's way of being considerate. The atmosphere in the company car, with no conversation, was certainly suffocating. Disappointed, I let out the breath I had been holding and answered at the same time.

"I did kendo from elementary school through college."

"You're not doing it now?"

"Yeah"

He paused for a moment, remembering the last time he had practiced kendo.

"I haven't even touched a bamboo sword since I started working."

The company car was caught at a red light again. Shinoda slowly approached the stop lane and stopped without missing an inch. At this rate, it would still be quite a while before we reached our destination, he thought as he yawned loudly.

I joined Shimae Shoji as a new graduate and this year marks my sixth year there. Shimae Shoji is a mid-sized trading company that specializes in chemical products. While the amount of sales is not comparable to that of major companies, our strength lies in the fact that we handle specialized products. It is difficult for major companies to enter this field, so the management is stable. The reason I chose this company is because of its stability, and I don't have any particular attachment to chemicals themselves.

I moved to Tokyo from Hiroshima ten years ago. Apart from kendo, all I remember from my student days was always playing around. Even now, whenever I go to my old hangout spots like Shinjuku and Shibuya, memories of my student days come back to me.

When I was looking for a job, I always wrote this in the "Club Activities and Other Achievements" section of my application form:

(High school) National High School Kendo Tournament, Boys Individual 3rd Place

(University) Kanto Student Kendo Championship Best 32

Every time I wrote those two lines in ballpoint pen, I was reminded that I was at my peak in my third year of high school. In the semi-finals of the national tournament, I had pushed Ishizaka Sho to the brink of victory. Speaking of Ishizaka, he was considered the strongest in his grade at the time. In fact, after winning the semi-finals, Ishizaka went on to win the final, achieving his second consecutive championship.

Just knowing that he was a player who competed against the famous Ishizaka earned him many recommendations. He chose a private university in Tokyo, where tuition would be free and he was attracted to the word "Tokyo."

My high school coach was subtly opposed to my plan. The university there doesn't practice much. And I wasn't sure if there was anyone who could properly teach Jodan. I ignored his advice and moved to Tokyo.

The coach's words were certainly true. The university he went to was a strong school that attracted promising players, but few of them had a record beyond that of high school. He was particularly promising among the new members and was able to play as a regular in games from his first year, but he was unable to achieve any remarkable results until the end.

Meanwhile, Sho Ishizaka continued to lead his generation even after entering university. Initially, there were rumors that he would join the Osaka Prefectural Police after graduating from high school, but apparently he changed his mind and continued on to higher education after receiving advice from his coach. Ishizaka went on to Naniwa University of Health and Sport Sciences, and even after entering university he won national championships in both individual and team competitions. While watching Ishizaka's matches from the stands, I decided to quit kendo in college.

I could have gotten into a major company through the connections of a former member of the Kendo club. However, if I did that, I would have had to join the company's Kendo club. I wanted to avoid that, so I searched for a job on my own and got a job offer from Shimae Shoji.

After graduating from university, I stopped practicing kendo. However, I still keep my protective gear and bamboo sword in the apartment where I live now. I just don't want to bother sending them back to my parents' house in Hiroshima.

After becoming a company employee, he wanted to explore possibilities other than kendo. When he first started working, he often went diving in Zushi. He spent every paycheck he had without thinking about saving money. Recently, he often plays futsal in Ginza or Oimachi with his colleagues. He sometimes hangs out with girls, but he doesn't have a specific girlfriend. He thinks it's okay to wait until he's over 30 before getting married.

On the way home from a client meeting, I was stuck in traffic. According to the car radio, there was a chain reaction accident on the road a little way ahead. There were no casualties, but it will probably take some time to clean up afterwards.

"It's not progressing at all."

Shinoda rested his chin on the steering wheel and said, "You're driving too slowly and that's why we got stuck in traffic." Eventually, bored Shinoda spoke up.

"Urabe-san, how good were you at kendo? I'm not bragging, but I made it to the prefectural soccer finals in high school. I got beaten badly in the finals, though."

"Inter-high school individual third place"

"Huh?" Shinoda said, turning around.

"Seriously? You're so strong. You didn't say anything like that at the welcome party the other day."

"That was a long time ago. Anyway, you really should stop using honorific language."

"Sorry, but third place in the nation. That's amazing."

It felt like Shinoda's eyes were looking at me a little differently. After a while, Shinoda spoke again.

"When did you start kendo?"

"Third Year of Elementary School"

"Nine years old. I was just drooling without thinking about anything."

"I didn't think about it either. I was weak when I was in elementary school."

"Oh, is that so? I thought you'd been strong since elementary school."

When he started kendo, Hiroshima was already dominated by an undisputed champion named Sho Ishizaka. Ishizaka swept away his upperclassmen and won the prefectural tournament almost every year. Then, Ishizaka went on to attend a junior high school in Osaka, where he enrolled at the prestigious Myoho Gakuen. The junior high school kendo world in Hiroshima was suddenly filled with many powerful players. However, even in this situation, he was still unable to achieve any notable results.

His name started to become a little better known after he received instruction in jodan from his high school coach. The young coach himself took up jodan and began to teach him. It was like a lie that he was still playing in chudan, and he started to win matches.

I'm not tall or physically strong, but for some reason, I was able to strike faster with my left foot than with my right. I can only assume that this is due to the structure of my body.

In a normal left-hand jodan, the stepping foot is the left foot. Before practice, I was playing around and trying out jodan, when the director came over with a surprised look on his face.

"Where did you learn the upper level?"

"No, nothing in particular..."

"So why are you hitting so fast?"

I was lucky to have a coach who could teach jodan. From that day on, the coach took notice of me, and one-on-one training began. The first thing I was taught was how to take a jodan stance. Keep your armpits tight, tuck your chin in, and don't relax your elbows. As I was yelled at many times during practice, I gradually got the hang of it. Next came striking. First, I thoroughly practiced kote, and then I learned how to feint.

Taking the Jodan stance means constantly raising both arms above your head during a match. When I first started, I could feel a large amount of lactic acid building up in my shoulders just by raising my arms for four minutes. However, if you do it every day, you get used to it, and by the time I was able to play properly in the Jodan stance, I hardly noticed any shoulder fatigue.

As I got used to the upper stance, I learned how to score a point. I knew that the speed of my strikes was my greatest asset, so I further improved my speed through training and practice. This made it even easier to score a point from my opponent. My senior told me, "Even if you know it's Urabe's men-striking, it's impossible to avoid it."

One day after practice, the director told me, "You have long arms."

Comparing it to the director's arm, it was more than five centimeters longer. He was almost the same height as the director.

"So you can see the face even from a distance."

Indeed, I often landed hits from a distance. A strike from a distance makes it easier to feint. It also helps to somewhat cover up my short height. It was then that I first felt grateful to my parents for giving me such long arms.

My first prize was coming in second place in a city tournament. That was in the summer of my second year of high school, and from then on I continued to achieve success in regional tournaments. My coach seemed to have high expectations for me, and he organized trips for me almost every week.

In his third year of high school, he was elected captain of the club. In team competitions, he only made it to the prefectural tournament, but he finally won the men's individual competition in the Hiroshima Inter-High School Championships. This was the first time the kendo club had competed in the Inter-High School Championships since its founding.

I often wondered what would have happened if Sho Ishizaka had stayed in Hiroshima. If he had been there, I would never have been able to win the championship. I still think that.

In the main tournament, the matches were decided easily, and before he knew it, he had advanced to the semi-finals. Ishizaka had injured his ankle in the previous match, so he must have been arrogant, thinking that he might be able to win. In the end, he was defeated just short of the goal. I can still remember the moment Ishizaka threw the one-handed thrust.

"It's all in the past."

"What is it?"

Shinoda, who was in the driver's seat, turned around.

"Nothing."

Even after I woke up from my memories, the traffic jam was still there.