Earthlings

What I'm really scared of is believing the words society makes me speak are my own.

How long do we have to just survive? When will we be able to live rather than just focus on surviving?

People can easily pass judgment on others when they’re protected by their own normality.

It's really hard to put into words things that are just a little bit not okay.

Society was a system for falling in love. People who couldn't fall in love had to fake it. What came first: the system or love?

I was a tool for the town's good, in two senses. Firstly, I had to study hard to become a work tool. Secondly, I had to be a good girl, so I could become a reproductive organ for the town.

The sooner I was brainwashed the better. That way I would no longer suffer.

The grown-ups, who did what society wanted of them, were shaken by those of us who did not.

My town is a factory for the production of human babies. People live in nests packed closely together. It's just like the silkworm room in Granny's house. The nests are lined up neatly in rows, and each contains a breeding pair of male and female humans and their babies. The breeding pairs raise their young inside their nests. The Baby Factory produces humans connected by flesh and blood. Eventually we children will also leave the factory and be shipped out. Once shipped out, male and female humans are trained how to take food back to their own nests. They become society's tools, receive money from other humans, and purchase food. Eventually these young humans also form breeding pairs, coop themselves up in new nests, and manufacture more babies.

The person who had given birth to me said I was a dead loss, so I decided it really must be true.

I had never been given any affirmation at home, so I was hungry for praise. When I was complimented, even on a whim by a hysterical teacher, my chest grew hot, and for some reason I felt like crying.

Everyone believed in the Factory. Everyone was brainwashed by the Factory and did as they were told. They all used their reproductive organs for the Factory and did their jobs for the sake of the Factory. My husband and I were people they’d failed to brainwash, and anyone who remained unbrainwashed had to keep up an act in order to avoid being eliminated by the Factory.

When will we be able to live rather than just focusing on surviving?

Love is a drug made in the brain to enable humans to mate. It’s simply an anesthetic. In other words, it’s an illusion made to prettify the painful mating act, to reduce the suffering and disgust of the sexual act. We might be able to use this anesthetic if we’re ever in pain. But for now I don’t think it’s necessary.

Deep down everyone hates work and sex, you know. They're just hypnotized into thinking that they're great.

Normality was contagious, and exposure to the infection was necessary to keep up with it.

It took all my effort just to remain at my zero level without becoming a minus.

It’s hard to put into words that things are just a little bit not OK.

Magical powers. I have to summon my magical powers. The power of darkness, the power of wind—any magical power will do, but I need something. I have to use my magical powers on my whole body before my heart feels anything.

Family" is hard work I thought.

I've been given my freedom, but I'm not any good at being free.

Firstly, I had to study hard to become a work tool. Secondly, I had to be a good girl, so that I could become a reproductive organ for the town. I would probably be a failure on both counts, I thought.

Even as an adult, my sister entrusted the keys of her life to other people. Didnt that scare her? How could she be so cheerful?

Deep in the mountains of Akishina where Granny and Grandpa live, fragments of night linger even at midday.

My womb was a factory component and would couple with someone's testes, which were also a factory component, in order to produce babies. [...] If we couldn't find his spaceship, society would make me form a breeding pair with someone else. I hoped we would find the spaceship before that happened.

Children’s lives never belong to them. The grown-ups own us. If your mom abandons you, you won’t be able to eat, and you can’t go anywhere without help from a grown-up. It’s the same for all children.” He reached out a hand to cut a flower from the bed. “That’s why we have to try hard to survive until we’ve grown up ourselves.

It’s handy having a dumpster in the house. In this house, that’s my role. When Dad and Mom and Kise get so fed up they can’t bear it any longer, they dump everything onto me.

Sometimes I thought being a Popinpobopian was effectively a mental illness that I had needed in order to protect myself, and the only way I would ever recover was by becoming a slave of the Factory.

From the tone of her voice, it was clear that my sister was not speaking for herself but on behalf of society. I envied her ability to do that.