Refusing Darkness: Reflections on 'Dark Harassment'

I recently finished reading Mizuki Tsujimura’s Dark Harassment (Yami-hara) during my night reading sessions. Rather than a horror or mystery novel, it felt more like a delicate observation log of social relationships.

“Dark Harassment” refers to the exorcism of darkness. In the book, “darkness” represents negative emotions within the heart, such as jealousy, anger, and fear. “Scattering darkness” means triggering the dark side of others through various means, depriving them of their reason and energy, making them gradually become detestable in the blur of right and wrong, and eventually dragging those around them into the abyss or even death. This setting of “mental parasitism” accurately captures the essence of those “toxic relationships” in reality.

A Good Mystery Must First Be a Good Novel

Dark Harassment adopts the form of “linked short stories,” where seemingly independent cases eventually weave into a huge “dark web.” The book consists of five chapters, with the first four focusing on the infiltration of “darkness” in different social scenarios:

Romantic Relationships: Care that evolves into suffocating control, such as the seemingly gentle but actually domineering phrase, “I still think you look better with short hair.”
Neighborhood Community: Subtle jealousy among a group of mothers, and the pathological struggle for social presence.
Workplace Hierarchy: Under the shadow of power, a boss demanding a three-hour phone call from a subordinate after work, making unreasonable demands for interaction.
School Socializing: Under the guise of “for your own good,” not lending textbooks to a classmate who forgot theirs, implementing the cruelest form of exclusion and bullying.

The final chapter completes the convergence through a shift in perspective, revealing the theme of the entire book and piecing together the complete logical map.

Mizuki Tsujimura’s writing is excellent; each chapter creates that sense of “uncanniness in daily life.” I can still clearly recall the cold sweat I broke into when reading the second chapter—Kaori Kambara, disheveled and holding a flip phone, completely out of place with her surroundings; at the end of the chapter, she suddenly appears in the residential complex, grimly banging on doors looking for someone… At that moment, holding my Kindle under the covers, I felt the surrounding temperature drop to freezing, and the darkness around me seemed to take on a physical form.

Zen Moment: Boundaries and Detachment

This book forms an interesting contrast with Six Lying College Students. Both discuss the black and white of interpersonal relationships, yet together they reveal the complexity of human nature.

My biggest takeaway from reading this book is: Respect your own feelings. When validly establishing boundaries, timely “withdrawal” is the best way to protect oneself. Perhaps I am indeed not mature enough, or perhaps naturally sensitive, but regardless, maintaining inner comfort is the greatest respect one can pay to oneself.

This reminds me of an experience exchanging work feedback with a team member. Their powerful “defense mechanism” led them to interpret my objective evaluation as a total denial of their personal ability, resulting in strong antagonistic emotions. They repeatedly emphasized how unfinished work was influenced by others (including me, who assigned the tasks), rather than their own reasons; they ignored 90% of the affirmation and fixated on that 10% of suggestions for growth; they constantly requested revisions to the written report out of fear for their year-end rating.

Now that the individual has transferred teams and the ratings are settled, everything seems to be in the past, but I still have two profound realizations:

Limit of a Manager: As a manager, I was not mature enough at the time. I failed to make corresponding communication adjustments based on different personalities. This lack of ability might also be why my leverage as a Manager was insufficient (see The Leverage Swap: Manager to IC in 2026).
Warning from Intuition: I can still recall the helplessness and fear I felt back then. Fear that they would fall into emotionalism again during 1-on-1s, fear that their temperament would change drastically leading to extreme behavior. At that time, I didn’t choose to “detach” in time, but out of a sense of responsibility, I tried to repeatedly explain my reasons to eliminate misunderstandings. Even though by then, I was already in a state of extreme discomfort.

That fear and discomfort must have been mutual at the time; the other party must have been deeply mired in pain as well. Now, I only hope that everyone is well, and even if we meet again in the future, I hope we have both become more mature people.