Electronics Store

[Posted： 2025/12/19]

This is a story told by G, an aspiring illustrator.

G had been considering buying a professional-grade LCD tablet. It would be a major investment, so he wanted to be sure of how it felt to draw on. To that end, he spent several days visiting major electronics stores around Akihabara, testing the display models with trial sketches.

At one of these stores, something strange happened.

When he stood before the display unit of the model he wanted, the previous customer's sketch was still on the screen. It was an illustration, drawn entirely in black, of a woman's face ? her head bowed.

The lines trembled, rough and amateurish.

But each stroke seemed obsessive, almost desperate. Even the strands of hair were drawn one by one, meticulously and densely.

Creeped out, G immediately erased the canvas layer and began testing it himself.

Yet as he drew, an unpleasant feeling crept over him, slowly, like a fog.

He left the store.

Still, he hadn't accomplished his mission: he needed to check the drawing feel and choose a tablet. So he headed to another electronics store nearby.

But what he saw there froze him.

On the display tablet ? the same model ? was the exact same image:

That same bowed head. That same trembling black line.

Not similar. Identical. The same drawing.

Was this some popular character from a manga or game that he just didn't recognize? A trending Vtuber, maybe?

No. The composition, the brushstroke, the aura ? they were unmistakably the same.

It didn't seem possible that someone else had copied it. It had to be the same person.

Was there an overly zealous customer going store to store, redrawing it over and over?

G settled on that theory, wiped the screen, and resumed testing.

But again… that uneasy feeling returned.

The longer he stayed, the heavier it became.

Eventually, he gave up for the day and went home.

A few days later, G decided to make his final purchase.

He returned to the first store ? surely, by now, that drawing was long gone.

That's what he thought.

But when he stood before the display unit, there it was again.

The same bowed woman's face, now drawn deeper, darker ? as if the blackness had seeped into the screen itself.

Maybe there was just a regular customer who liked dark art.

Or maybe ? just maybe ? it really was a popular character G didn't know.

But G couldn't shake the unease growing in his chest.

He left the store. Again. Without buying anything.

That night, G ordered the same model from a major online retailer.

When it arrived ? brand new, unopened ? he was almost nervous to check it.

But the screen was blank.

No woman.

No bowed head.

No black lines.

Just empty white.

As it should be.