STRANGE VOICE

BloodyGaikotsu

Wonder if you, guys, were following (ENGLISH LIGHT NOVELS)'s horror week.
And they topped it off with a review of untranslated one-shot work called "STRANGE VOICE" and I ended up really wanting to read due to Kastel's review.
As always, I know full well this work ain't the most JNC-y but can't help like, promote, and want what I like.
It's not exactly a fun work or something you just enjoy characters exploring foreign fascinating works or having splendid life or just suffering through funny and simple misuderstandings.
It's something more grounded in reality, centered around guilty, hurt people.

alt text
Publisher: Gagaga Bunko (Shogakukan)
Status: Complete - One volume

Synopsis: (Copied from Kastel's review)
The third year of middle school should have been a straightforward year for everyone. Mizuha would have remained the eccentric but cute girl people talk to in classes. Hibiki might have been the popular rebel in school. And Ryuusuke would just be the invisible kid in the corner of the room. Their teacher who looks way like a bad James Dean ripoff should be taking it easy to see this class off to high school as well.

Middle schools are rarely that lighthearted.

One day, Ryuusuke was beaten up and left barely alive. Hospitalized for weeks, he was literally and emotionally scarred from the experience; his disfigured face provided ample evidence of bullying. He never returned to school. The main perpetrator, Hibiki, remained profoundly ignorant of what had happened and no one dared to point out the obvious.

The class went on, aware of their precarious situation but uninterested in doing something about it. But what could they have done to stop Hibiki and his cadre? No one but him was in the wrong. Everyone in the class was — and is — neutral. It’s all Hibiki’s fault that they are entangled in this potential blacklisting from good high schools. They need to buck up their studies, so high school admission officers are willing to ignore the past. And in a way, isn’t this Ryuusuke’s fault too for not saying anything? The students can only mutter their complaints, look away from the scene of the crime, and move on with their studies.

But Mizuha understands guilt. Indeed, she may see herself as the embodiment of guilt. After taking a shower, she notices that the lacerations on her body she has inflicted on have not gone away. Rather, there is the tacit implication it may have increased. Overwhelming events force her to puke and collapse to the ground as if struck with a seizure. This event of Ryuusuke’s bullying is thus another manifestation of her guilt, of her low self-esteem, of her solipsism. It is but another episode in her life

alt text
Link to the original review:
https://englishlightnovels.com/2018/10/20/jpn-review-strange-voice/