Window 3 'Slime Marsh': Second Signal Test Also Answered — TDA Upgrades It to 'Signs of Awareness'

As previously reported, Window 3, "the Slime Marsh," in a valley in Inagi in West Tama, saw its first deliberate signal test on the night of the 13th, separate from the one conducted earlier at Window 5 behind the Third Appraisal Center. With the ethics committee's approval, the Dimensional Survey Division flashed the observation room's lights in a "two seconds on, one second off" rhythm three times, and the creature known by registry number 88-C, nicknamed "the Watcher," changed its body color in near-matching rhythm three times in a row — a result reported on the 14th.

On the 16th, the division announced that a second signal test had been carried out during a 92-minute opening from 1:50 to 3:22 a.m. on the 15th. This time, to rule out the possibility that an identical repeat signal could reflect mere habituation or coincidence, officials deliberately changed the pattern — inverting the ratio to "one second on, two seconds off" and changing the count from three flashes to four. The Watcher again responded with roughly matching color changes, four times, following both the new rhythm and the new count. "If we had simply repeated the exact same condition, it could still be explained as a learned reflex. This time we changed the condition, and the response changed along with it. That's harder to call coincidence," a division official explained.

On the strength of this result, the division announced on the 16th that it is upgrading Window 3 to the "signs of awareness" tier — the same tier as Window 5, "the Sword Country," which was recognized on the 5th after market crowds there were seen repeatedly raising placards toward the window. This marks the first time two of the five stable windows have reached this tier at once. The two cases, however, arrived there by entirely different routes: Window 5 through what looked like deliberate human behavior, Window 3 through the physiological response of a single creature. "We still don't know whether there are people on the other side, or creatures, or what form of awareness is involved — and yet two very different windows have produced signs with a similar texture. How to receive that is, if anything, the real homework ahead," the division said.

Etsuko Kajiura, 58, a professor at Wangyo University who chairs the external expert review panel, told this paper, "Window 5 involves a social human act, Window 3 a single creature's physiological response — two cases with completely different observational character, now being lumped under the same word, 'signs.' Before the word runs ahead of us, I'd like November's first meeting to start by carefully separating the two."

The division was careful to stress what "signs of awareness" does and does not mean: an observational judgment that the other side is likely reacting to our presence, with no claim at all about intent or understanding. Whether the Watcher's color shift is a "reply" or simply an unconscious physiological reaction to a change in light remains unknown. One anonymous window keeper, who sits through the night in the observation room, shared a line from the logbook: "On the day we confirmed there had really been an exchange — we sent something, and something on the other side answered — I remember my teacup had gone colder than usual. I think my hand had stopped moving while I watched." The ethics committee has decided to limit future signal tests to roughly once a week, and the division emphasized that not every test will produce a major announcement.

As previously reported, technician Toru Yuzuki continues analyzing the light procession and the newly recorded "sound" at Window 1, "the Lit City." The division clarified that it now treats the Window 1 analysis — of something that appears to have originated from the other side — as observationally distinct from the Window 3 and Window 5 verification work, which concerns responses to signals sent from this side. As a result, the agenda for the external expert panel's early-November meeting has grown from six items to seven. "We still know nothing about what's over there," the division concluded. "All we know is that something on the other side appears to have answered something we sent." The characteristic refusal to draw a firmer conclusion remained unchanged.