“How curious it was, [...], that we humans had taken millions of year to crawl up out of the swamps and yet, within minutes of death, we were already tobogganing back down the slope.”

“There are very few of us who remember the day, the moment, when our childhood ends. For most of us, the sun sets on our innocence gradually, sliding down over the western horizon like a toboggan run down over a long, steep slope. We are never really conscious of the moment we reach the bottom of the slope; we just know that one day we wake up and the toboggan ride is over.”

“How many minutes will still die in the swamp of your illusion of being human?”

“Our favourite amusement during that winter was tobogganing. In places the shore of the lake rises abruptly from the water's edge. Down these steep slopes we used to coast. We would get on our toboggan, a boy would give us a shove, and off we went! Plunging through drifts, leaping hollows, swooping down upon the lake, we would shoot across its gleaming surface to the opposite bank. What joy! What exhilarating madness! For one wild, glad moment we snapped the chain that binds us to earth, and joining hands with the winds we felt ourselves divine!”

“We didn't have time to go tobogganing, because we didn't have the toboggan.”

“Well, well, what have we here? A piece of Katagari trash that’s taken up refuge with the bears? (Stone)No, just a wolf who’s going to kick your ass back to whatever hole it crawled out of. (Fang)”