Grimgal of Ashes and Illusion - Volume 20 - Chapter 1

1. If Life’s Made Up of Nothing but Mistakes

What happened?

Do you really want to know?

Yeah, I figured.

But consider how I feel, having to answer your question.

It’s not a simple tale. There were a lot of different circumstances that played a part. It was a complicated situation in all kinds of ways. And it’s not like I even understand it all myself. Hell, forget understanding everything, my knowledge barely amounts to a fistful of sand. And even that may be overstating it. What I know might be closer to a single grain of sand.

But even that single grain of sand will be a long story.

If I were to try to tell you from the beginning—at least, the beginning as far back as I can remember it, when I heard the word “Awaken” and opened my eyes—it would take far too long. It’s not that I don’t have enough time, though. To be honest, it’s just that it’s hard for me to talk about. And I don’t want to. There’s that too.

Let’s start in the middle, back when I was called Haruhiro.

I mean, back when there were still people who called me that.

Yeah.

I had a few of those.

People who mattered to me.

It would have been, I think, January of the 660th year of the Arabakian Calendar. Yeah, on the twenty-second. I’m pretty sure I’ve got the year right, but who knows. I’m not quite so confident about the day. But anyway, it was either January twenty-first or twenty-second of 660 A.C. Or maybe it was the twenty-third? Somewhere around there.

Back then, I wasn’t alone.

I had comrades.

Ranta.

He wasn’t as tall as me, so you’d probably say he was short. But short though he was, he was capable of releasing these incredible bursts of explosive strength—and calling them “explosive” is not even remotely an exaggeration. Was that something he was born with? Probably not. He wasn’t the type to work hard and slowly build up to something, but he had some real tenacity to him. He wasn’t the kind of guy who’d ever just sit there quietly while someone looked down at him from on high. He was noisy, and stubborn as hell. No matter how life beat him down, he never let it keep him there. More than anything, he was strong of heart, and brimming with vital energy.

I could never bring myself to like Ranta. We were never able to get along, from the first time we met, and there were countless times when I thought I couldn’t keep working with him. We parted after a fight once, and there was a long time after that when we were each doing our own thing. As for him, I’ll bet he hated my indecisiveness. No matter how much time went by, we were like water and oil.

Even now, I hate the guy. Just remembering the way his voice grated on my ears makes me mad. He had curly hair, and whenever it got too long, he’d wrap it around his fingers, then cut it with a knife. That move always pissed me off. Like I said before, I was called Haruhiro back then. But that guy would deliberately call me Parupiro, Parupirorin, and other similar names. That kind of stupid flippant behavior really rubbed me the wrong way.

He had all sorts of things I lacked.

Was I jealous of him? No. I will insist to my dying breath that I was not. I never wished that I was more like him. Not once.

But before I knew it, I found myself following him. He always kept on pushing forward. He wasn’t the type to look back and wait for me to catch up. If I had stayed where I was, he’d have left me behind. I don’t know if he was aware that he was pulling me, pulling us, along. I’m not him, so how could I know? But I doubt it.

He was just living true to himself.

Come to think of it, he had a scar on his face. It started on the upper right part of his forehead, crossed his brow, and ended under his left ear. It was a big, prominent scar. Yet he kept his head high, as if to say that scar was just a part of him. There were times when he seemed so radiant to me.

Then there was Yume.

If she hadn’t been around, our journey would have been much shorter, and no one would be here now, looking back on it.

I’d never known anyone as agile and robust as she was. I still don’t. Obviously, that’s nothing more than my personal perspective. Others might disagree. But I won’t let anyone who didn’t know Yume reject my view of her. I genuinely liked her. I could never hate her, no matter what. There was nothing to hate about her.

So I can understand why Ranta loved her so strongly and deeply. It would be strange not to love someone like her. I think the reason I didn’t love her in that way was because I simply liked her. My affection for her was—and I realize how weird it is to be saying this myself—incredibly innocent. I’m sure the idea of trying to make her my own never even crossed my mind. Not once. She cared about me too. I never once doubted the trust and kindness she offered me. I never needed to ask something of her. She gave everything freely, without being asked. And always without expecting anything in return.

I don’t think Ranta expected anything in return from her either. But maybe, in order to keep himself strong, he wanted her to be someone he could show his weakness to without restraint—basically someone who would indulge him. Yume was probably the only person who could have done that for a guy like Ranta.

It was around January twenty-second, 660 A.C.

I was working with Ranta and Yume. Yume’s master Itsukushima and the wolf-dog Poochie were with us too.

Itsukushima was a generation older than us, or more like two generations. He always seemed more like a parent than a big brother figure, so it feels a little bit wrong to call him one of us. He was a hunter adept in the art of survival, and a thoughtful adult.

Ranta, Yume, and I had spent many years in Grimgar, so we weren’t kids anymore. We were adults, at least in some respects. But looking back on it now, I think maybe we hadn’t fully matured. Me in particular.

Through a series of events, I had become the leader of the group, yet I can’t help but feel like I might have been the least mature of all of us. And because of that, having Itsukushima with us was a big help.

Itsukushima basically never told us how things were, or what we ought to do in any given circumstance. He moved on his own, and showed by example, not by words. That was the style of that most hunter-like of hunters. And, though I guess this should be obvious, Poochie didn’t talk either. As I recall, Poochie was fairly old for a wolf-dog. Maybe that was why whenever he sat in silence like an old forest sage, he seemed to understand the nature of things far better than us humans. I honestly believe that Poochie had a high degree of intelligence, even if it wasn’t the same kind that we have. The fact is, there are any number of creatures out there that are wiser than us crafty humans.

Around January twenty-second of 660 A.C., we returned to Alterna.

Yes, that Alterna.

Or what was left of it.

It was in awful shape. I could say that it wasn’t even a shadow of its former self, but that doesn’t quite capture it. It wasn’t that it was a pile of rubble, or that it had been laid to waste, or anything like that.

They were gone. The people. Not one of them was left.

In their place, the sekaishu—those dark, tubelike entities—were swarming all over the place.

Sekaishu. Back then, we didn’t really know what they were. Or rather, it’s fair to say that we had absolutely no clue whatsoever.

I think I sensed that something felt off about them. Like they were clearly not of this world. But, well, that wasn’t all that uncommon in Grimgar. Still, the sekaishu were bizarre.

Black. The sekaishu were pitch black. A pure black, without a hint of luster. They didn’t reflect so much as a mote of light. Does any material like that exist in the natural world? They were flexible, expanding and contracting, but could also be hard as well. Even if you slashed at them with a blade, they weren’t easy to cut through. You couldn’t hurt them. They moved. But at the same time, it was hard to imagine that they were alive. I didn’t sense anything resembling life from them.

They were incompatible with this world, Grimgar—one of many worlds, created according to certain rules—and they were a thing, or a phenomenon, that was impossible to define as living or unliving.

That was basically what the sekaishu were.

If I were to try to put it into words back then, that was the sort of fuzzy understanding that I had.

Back then, we were resting at the building that had once been the Temple of Lumiaris in the North District, which was located on an elevated bit of terrain. Then I went out to scout.

I was going to the thieves’ guild in West Town. I had a feeling that, even with the state the town was in, one of the mentors, Eliza, might still have been there. If even she was gone, then that would mean there wasn’t a soul left in Alterna. I wanted to check. I’d been a thief myself, so I was used to operating solo. Working that way was easier for me too. I cared about my comrades. Cared far too much. I didn’t want to lose anyone. Couldn’t afford to lose anyone else.

The thieves’ guild was empty. Eliza wasn’t there. How did that make me feel? I can’t recall.

My first encounter with one of the night-clad ones—beings that completely went against everything we thought we knew about the sekaishu—left a much greater impact on me.

The night-clad one, to put it simply, was a creature shaped like a human—or something similar—that had been wrapped in the sekaishu.

The first night-clad one was riding on a mass of sekaishu that had taken the form of a four-legged beast, and carried a shining sword and shield. The creature also seemed to contain a human body. If that sword and shield had been made of metals produced in Grimgar, then they might have been reflective, but they wouldn’t have emitted light, so I could tell at a glance that they were relics.

Since ancient times in Grimgar, there have been objects called relics that have popped up here and there throughout history.

What are relics, really?

I know that now, of course.

They are things that are not of this world, but which come from others, crossing into Grimgar in some manner, whether they drift there or are sent there. The process doesn’t matter, only that they’re from a foreign world and have ended up in Grimgar.

That’s the true nature of relics, if you can really call it a “true nature.”

In a way, we ourselves might also have been relics. Relics were commonplace in Grimgar. You couldn’t really call them rare, but some of them could be valuable. Weapons and tools that had special powers or incredible abilities were hard to come by. When trying to use might to force others to submit, those sorts of relics could be incredibly potent.

Not many people had useful relics. Those were pretty uncommon.

Since that night-clad one had two of them, if I had been thinking about it with a clear head, I could have narrowed down the list of candidates for who the person within had been considerably. I was anything but calm at the time, though, and went into a total panic once I encountered a second night-clad one.

The second wore golden armor and a crown, and carried a staff. Those were relics too. The second night-clad one could fire lightning from their staff, and was also able to fly. Their relics were powerful. I didn’t have any idea what was going on at the time, but thinking back on it now, the second night-clad one probably didn’t have a human inside. It was a goblin—the goblin king, Gwagajin.

I ran like mad. It was all I could do. I ran and I ran, and that’s all I can remember. Was there any point where I gave up and accepted that my number was up? Even that isn’t clear to me.

But right in the nick of time, someone poked their head out from between the old Volunteer Soldier Corps office and the building beside it. A human. A living human. It was Eliza.

I guess she must have just been away when I had visited the thieves’ guild. I wasn’t a total amateur. If I had carefully searched the ruins, I would have been able to tell whether someone had been living there, but I hadn’t searched. Thinking about it, I might have been in a state of total shock at the time. She was still in Alterna. Had she been out scouting? And then she found me, running around, lost? She told me where to run, and I managed to escape somehow. Without her help, it’s very likely—no, almost a certainty—that I would have been captured by the night-clad ones. On that day, probably January twenty-second of the year 660 A.C., my life would have ended right there in Alterna.

Maybe that would have been better?

I’ve thought that before.

Once or twice.

No, more than that. I’ve thought it more times than I can count.

But even if I were able to go back to that day and do things over, I’m sure that I would still try to survive. I may not have Ranta’s spine, but you could say I’m greedy for life. When placed on the brink of life and death, I choose life every time. I don’t know why. But I do.

If you’ve never come close to dying before, then remember this: Sometimes whether we live or die comes down to spur-of-the-moment decisions. That isn’t always the case, but if you find yourself in that kind of situation, there’s no room for thought. Your true nature comes to the fore. Those who are attached to life live on stubbornly, while those who aren’t lose their lives with surprising ease.

To put it another way, those who end up in a situation that should kill them, but don’t die, are incapable of letting themselves die. And as somebody who’s failed to die, I’m left with no choice but to go on living as I am. So, if the end of life comes for me too, I’m sure it will be a fitting death. If I have the good fortune to die as a human, that is.

Until that time comes, I have no choice but to accept that I am me, and pull myself along no matter how heavy that burden is.

I kept trying to live despite not really wanting to, and headed into the rear of the Volunteer Soldier Corps office from the back alley entrance. It was an awfully small door, even for a back entrance, and there was no sign that it had seen regular use. Then I descended down a vertical shaft inside the building to reach the basement.

Eliza told me there was a culvert there. It dated back to the days before Alterna was a fortress city. First the scouts of the Kingdom of Arabakia had built an outpost here, and then after a village had grown up around it, they had built aqueducts to bring in water from the nearby river. Later, people had dug wells, and it had gradually become harder to draw water from the river, so they had started to use the aqueducts as drains. In time, a portion of them had been filled in with dirt, or covered with stone.

The culvert was long forgotten. One eccentric thief had discovered it, and then reworked it to serve as a secret passageway. That thief had been Eliza and Barbara’s teacher, so the two of them had been forced to help work on it. The thieves had also found the other remaining culverts, and brought in craftspeople to reinforce them where needed, creating a network with entry points all over the city.

I still remember Eliza telling me that story in a disinterested tone, but explaining it in an odd amount of detail. I think she was probably reminiscing. She had no interest in the here and now. Her heart was directed solely toward the past. That was the feeling I got.

Eliza had a weirdly strong aversion to being seen by others, and when she showed herself in front of them, she would hide her face with her long hair and a scarf. She seemed incredibly bad at socializing, and not the sort to hang out in groups or make friends, but I think, maybe, she was proud of her work. She had a stronger sense of responsibility than most, and it was more out of a sense of duty than out of obligation. She likely felt a degree of loyalty and attachment to the thieves’ guild too.

However, nearly all of the thieves that Mentor Eliza and her colleagues had trained were dead by that point. Even Barbara, whom she had been close with, had died. The way I see it, Eliza had devoted her life to the guild. Now the guild that she treasured was in ruins, and would soon vanish completely. Maybe she’d lost sight of her reason to live.

When we emerged from the culvert, we were inside the former headquarters of the Frontier Army which was also in the North District, not far from the Temple of Lumiaris, which was just up the hill from it. I noticed that Eliza was looking awfully grimy. Her hair was all matted, and had flecks of white stuff in it. Her dark clothes were little more than rags at this point, and they looked baggy on her. She’d shrunk. It looked like she was badly emaciated. I got the feeling she hadn’t been eating much.

Right before we reached the temple, Eliza turned to head back.

Obviously, I stopped her. I was worried about Eliza. She was quietly choosing her own death. That was all I could assume. But she had seen me in trouble, and had been unable to abandon me. I didn’t know her that well, but we were both thieves, and she was my teacher Barbara’s coworker. It wouldn’t have been right to abandon her.

“Would you like to come with us, Eliza-san?”

When I asked that, she replied, “Where?” Her voice was so tiny, so lacking in intonation that it hurt. I remember wanting to cry when I heard it. No lie. If I could have cried, I would have. Maybe if I were the kind of person who cried at times like that, things might have worked out differently.

“We’re still trying to figure that out.”

That was what I told her then. We hadn’t come back to Alterna with any plan in mind, only a vague hope that we might find some kind of hint. As we probably should have expected, that hope had been in vain. We needed a plan for what to do next. I’m not going to claim that I wasn’t hoping that she could help us come up with something. I probably was.

I wanted help. I had Ranta. I had Yume. And I had Itsukushima too. Even Poochie the wolf-dog was helping me. But it still wasn’t enough. Ever since I had first awoken in Grimgar, I had been living my life with the help and support of others. I had never thought to try and do anything alone. Not once.

Eliza helped me too. The best she could, in her own way. In dribs and drabs, she told me everything that she knew, as if she were squeezing the information out of herself.

Fifteen days earlier, the black sekaishu had begun pressing into Alterna. Shinohara and Orion had left town through the south gate to see what was happening, and no one knew what had become of them. Early the next day, Jin Mogis had opened the north gate, and attempted an escape with the cavalry and infantry. She didn’t know if he had succeeded, but not long after that, the sekaishu had overrun Alterna.

When had those night-clad ones begun wandering the city? Eliza couldn’t say for certain, but the first time she had seen one of them had been seven days earlier.

Since the sekaishu had destroyed Alterna, Eliza had only been outside town once. She confirmed that the sekaishu had also struck Damuro. It had apparently wiped out the goblins there. But she hadn’t gone as far as Riverside Iron Fortress. She had to stay in Alterna. That was the conclusion she had come to.

“Because that’s my role,” she explained in a monotone voice.

Should I have tried to convince her otherwise? I think even if I had said everything I could think of, it wouldn’t have done much good. But it wouldn’t have killed me to make the attempt, would it?

“There are stores of food in the thieves’ guild. I’ll share some with you,” she offered.

I turned her down. There was no way I could have accepted, because as long as she had food, there was a chance that she’d survive. Once it ran out, I wasn’t so sure. I had a feeling that rather than wander around searching for something to eat, she might decide to let things take their course and starve to death. I didn’t want that.

I wanted her to live as long as she could, even if that went against her own wishes. I refused to take any action that might have shortened her life. I could never have done such a thing. Even if what she wanted was to rest, to be set free from the hollow suffering of living all by herself, I wouldn’t help her with her passive suicide.

Please, don’t make me bear any more pain.

I parted ways with Eliza and returned to the Temple of Lumiaris where my comrades were waiting. Itsukushima was away, having headed outside with Poochie. I told Ranta and Yume that I had met Eliza. It would have been cowardly to conceal that fact from them. Or maybe I just lacked the guts to brazenly lie like that.

I felt like Ranta would fault me for not bringing her along. But maybe he had a different perspective on the matter than I did. All he said was, “Okay.”

“We can always come back, after all,” said Yume.

Yume’s eyes were always set on the next thing—on what came tomorrow. She forgave me, and consoled me. Oh, yeah, I thought. That’s right. This isn’t the end, I chose to believe. We can come back to Alterna again. If I’m worried about Eliza, I can check in on her. I mean, maybe in time she’ll have a change of heart. Maybe next time we’ll be able to bring her out of Alterna.

Itsukushima and Poochie returned and we spent the night in the temple.

It wasn’t just the sekaishu roaming Alterna. The even more dangerous night-clad ones were there too. We couldn’t find any reason to stay. After talking it over, we agreed we should go to Riverside Iron Fortress.

We left the temple at dawn, and headed in the direction of the northwest wall. Part of the fortifications there had collapsed, providing us with a small area where we could slip through. That was where we’d entered Alterna too.

Along the way, I felt eyes on me.

I looked to see Eliza, standing on a roof about twenty meters away. She wasn’t really trying to hide, but she also didn’t wave or do anything to communicate with us. It seemed unlikely that she had just happened to notice us while she was out for a stroll. She’d refused my offer, saying she had no intention of coming along, but even so, she couldn’t remain indifferent.

Yume waved to Eliza. Eliza didn’t move. Ranta clicked his tongue before opening his mouth as if to say something. Maybe he meant to throw a mean comment in her direction. It would have been in character for him. But ultimately he said nothing.

Itsukushima and Poochie started walking, and we followed them.

Eliza followed behind us, staying at a distance of at least twenty meters. No, it’s not quite right to say she “followed” us. She was watching over us. She wouldn’t let anything happen to us before we left Alterna. She cared for our well-being. That was how it felt to me then, and even now I believe that’s what it was.

In time, we reached the spot where the wall had crumbled, and Eliza vanished. Had she departed, as if to say that her job was done? No, that wasn’t it. At some point, she had moved to the top of the wall. She was standing on the other side of the collapsed portion that we were about to pass through. In other words, she had circled around to go from being behind us a moment ago to in front of us now.

Eliza was one of the managers of the thieves’ guild, and had been a mentor in charge of teaching other thieves. I had been made a mentor too, but only as a stopgap measure due to severe personnel shortages. Unlike me, she was the real deal. Barbara-sensei had been too, and she was an incredible thief that I could never hope to hold a candle to.

She barely moved until we got near the collapsed part of the wall. She just stood up there, watching us.

Unable to restrain herself, Yume waved again. “See ya!”

As she shouted that, Eliza finally reacted. But not to Yume.

Eliza turned to look behind her, gazing upward. Did I say anything then? I was definitely shocked.

Because they were there. A night-clad one.

It was the one that wore golden armor and a crown, and carried a staff. How long had they been floating there? I couldn’t imagine they had been there long. Probably only since right before Eliza had turned to look. This is just an educated guess on my part, but I think the night-clad one had been on the other side of the wall. And then maybe they had floated up from there without making a sound? Eliza must have sensed them.

The night-clad one leveled their staff at Eliza. Before they could unleash their lightning, she threw something like a dagger toward them. The bolt struck the dagger, not her, and exploded.

“Go!” Eliza shouted.

I immediately took off running. Her intent was clear, and I couldn’t possibly have misunderstood. She was telling us, I’ll draw the night-clad one’s attention. You get out of Alterna, and run as far as you can. I had moved to obey her instinctively.

“We can’t—!” Yume did the opposite of me. She tried to scale the crumbling wall, but Ranta immediately seized her by the arm.

“No, Yume!”

“Another one’s coming!” Itsukushima shouted.

He was looking in the direction we had come from. I looked too. The staff-wielder wasn’t the only night-clad one. There was at least one more, and there they were. The night-clad one that carried a shining sword and shield, and rode atop a mass of sekaishu that had formed a four-legged beast, was rushing fluidly down the street toward us.

“Run!” the senior hunter urged us.

Yume still wasn’t in agreement, but Ranta and I physically dragged her out of Alterna against her will. Itsukushima sent us ahead with Poochie, then came through the gap too.

Lightning flashed somewhere. I couldn’t see Eliza or the night-clad one with the staff, but if her opponent was still firing off lightning, that meant Eliza was fine.

I kept pumping my legs. I didn’t need to check to know that Yume, Ranta, Itsukushima, and Poochie were still nearby. There was a forest just north of Alterna, and we were fleeing into it. We didn’t expect to be safe once we got there, but there weren’t any other options. As I was running, I looked back occasionally. I hoped there would be nothing chasing us. My wish did not come true.

We were being chased.

It wasn’t just the night-clad one with the shining sword and shield riding on a beast made of sekaishu. There was a horde of sekaishu following them, almost like a big black wave. I call it a wave, but unfortunately we weren’t on the beach. This wasn’t the kind of wave that crashed against the shore and receded. No matter where we went, that black wave would follow, and eventually it was going to catch us. Then we’d be swallowed up and probably drown in it.

“It’s make or break now! Let’s split up!” Itsukushima barked a command from up ahead in the forest.

I don’t recall Yume pushing back on it. We were all out of breath, and she wasn’t in any shape to talk. I’m sure it had degraded our ability to make decisions, and because of that, once someone suggested something, we had no choice but to do whatever it was.

I have my doubts about whether that was really the case, though.

How sure am I that I haven’t doctored my own memories to make them more favorable to me?

It’s definitely true that I did as Itsukushima said without another word.

It was all I could do at the time.

It should have been the same for Ranta, and even for Yume.

So it wasn’t my fault. Not exclusively my fault.

But isn’t that just the way I want to remember it?

Whatever my true reasoning was, I raced north into the forest. The next thing I knew, I was alone. Ranta wouldn’t leave Yume, right? I’m sure he’d never have left her alone. If he was with Yume, then if worse came to worst, he could act as a decoy to help her get away, or something. But he couldn’t do anything if he wasn’t with her. He’d be useless. Maybe I should have tried to stay near Yume too?

That was probably what I ought to have done. But by the time I realized that, it was too late.

Itsukushima was an experienced hunter, and could operate just fine even without getting proper sleep. He rarely showed any signs of tiredness in front of us. Had he been putting up a strong front for us? If so, it would have required impressive mental resilience. His stamina was incredible too. For his age, that is. Itsukushima was much older than we were. The age gap was probably so wide that he could have been our father.

Maybe Itsukushima had used up his stamina racing all the way from Alterna to the forest? But I don’t think he could have told us if he was at his limit. He wouldn’t have wanted to drag down those who were younger than him. That was why he had ordered us to run in different directions, to divide our pursuers. If we had all run away in one big clump, then we would have all lived or died together. That being the case, he would have preferred to have at least one of us get away, even if not all of us could. This is Itsukushima we’re talking about. I’m sure he wanted to guarantee that Yume would survive, at the very least. But Yume was the biggest problem with that. She loved Itsukushima like a father, and wouldn’t have abandoned him even if he’d begged her to do it. Maybe that was why? Itsukushima did it for Yume.

If it was for my comrades, I could have given my life. I wouldn’t even have regretted it. Itsukushima had done what came naturally to him. And my perspective was the same as his. I wouldn’t say that there was anything particularly special or unique about the choice he made. If I had been in Itsukushima’s shoes, I’d have done the same.

Come to think of it, Poochie was a pretty old dog too. It’s awkward to say this, but he probably didn’t have long to live anyway. Itsukushima loved that dog, though. Maybe he did what he did because he wanted to share Poochie’s fate. In a way, that would have been a fitting way for Itsukushima—that most hunter-like of hunters—to go out.

Unconsciously, I had begun using my thief techniques to erase the sound of my footsteps. There were sekaishu all over, but none of them showed any signs of viewing me as prey. I drifted through the forest, not really feeling all that threatened. Dried leaves blew in the wind, like seeds released by the trees.

I had a destination in mind. We’d originally planned to go to Riverside Iron Fortress. If I went there, I could meet up with my comrades. However, I felt terrible because of what had just happened, and I felt sad. I was beating myself up over it, but I had already long since given up on Itsukushima and Poochie. I was never going to see the hunter or his wolf-dog again. But there was hope for Ranta and Yume.

They’ll be fine. I want them to be fine. If they aren’t both still alive, Itsukushima and Poochie won’t be able to rest in peace. It’d be bad for me too. I have no idea what I’ll do if something happens to them.

I didn’t rush. I walked slowly but steadily, taking care to keep my distance from the sekaishu so they wouldn’t detect me and decide that I was an enemy. The sekaishu never approached me, and I never deliberately got close to them either.

A number of times—I forget how many—I spotted a night-clad one. But only at a distance. That was still enough to make me cower in the shadows of the trees, though, waiting until they moved on and were totally out of sight.

One time, I spotted the second night-clad one with the golden armor, crown, and staff silently flying around. I wondered what had happened to Eliza. That was the only time that I gave any more thought to her safety.

When I finally exited the forest, the sun had already set and it was dark out.

If I had simply gone straight north through the forest, then I would have come out close to Deadhead Watching Keep. However, continuing northeast through the forest from there had eventually brought me to the Quickwind Plains. There was nothing to hide behind on the plains. Was I scared? I don’t know. But whether I was or not, I decided to play it safe, and only started crossing the Quickwind Plains once night had fallen, heading west.

Uncharacteristically, there was very little wind on the Quickwind Plains. The sky was almost completely clear, and studded with stars that didn’t twinkle.

There was a moon out too. The red moon. But the light of the moon and stars was powerless. The land was locked in pitch-black darkness, and even with my eyes fully adjusted, I felt like I had been blindfolded. It was endlessly dark, aside from the eerily clear stars and the red orb hanging in the sky. I was only able to keep track of the general direction I was traveling in thanks to them.

Occasionally, I’d trip over, or step on, what I assume were sekaishu. That made me panic at first, but once I realized nothing was going to happen, I stopped caring. It wasn’t the sekaishu I needed to be wary of, but the night-clad ones. Most of the time, the individual sekaishu bodies didn’t react to even direct physical stimuli.

Night-clad ones were another matter. Those things were deeply connected to the sekaishu, and you might be able to say they were a type of sekaishu themselves, but really they were very much their own thing. Maybe because there were humans—or humanlike creatures—inside of them, they seemed to have it out for us.

The Quickwind Plains were quiet, as if all life on them had perished. I was making as little noise as possible as I moved, to the point that I started to question whether I myself was dead or alive. Like, maybe I had died somewhere along the way. There are times when I think I did. Maybe this is all nothing more than a cruel dream I’m watching before I pass into the long sleep of death.

When the sky started to brighten, I turned slightly toward the south, and continued west along the foothills of the Tenryu Mountains. It was maybe forty kilometers from Alterna to Riverside Iron Fortress as the crow flies. Following the foothills was a bit of a detour, though, and no matter how much I hurried, I wouldn’t arrive until the sun had fully risen. I didn’t have the courage to walk boldly through the Quickwind Plains where I would have been far too visible in the full light of day. Ultimately, I didn’t reach Riverside Iron Fortress until the sun was well on its way to setting again.

What had happened to this place, which the Volunteer Soldier Corps had retaken from the orcs of the Southern Expedition, and made into their primary stronghold? I had no idea at this point. But it was plain as day that nobody was around.

The hardened fortress surrounded by defensive walls abutted the Jet River, with part of the fortress actually extending out into it. Fourteen towers stood inside the walls, with bridges connecting them. I could see that a number of those bridges, and also the gates, had been destroyed. There were a huge number of birds perched on the walls and the towers. Some of them were flying around above the fortress as well.

Though I approached the gates, I couldn’t bring myself to go inside. I wish I could say it was out of wariness, but that’s not it. I was just sick of it all. I was feeling lazy, and didn’t want to do anything anymore. I hadn’t eaten since I’d left Alterna, or even had any water. My stomach was empty, and my throat was dry, yet apathy was still winning out over that.

I moved more than ten meters away from the gate, and sat down on the ground with my back to the wall. It wasn’t a very relaxing posture, though, so I eventually raised one of my knees and hugged it.

One of the birds up on the wall crapped on my head.

My only thought was, Oh, bird poop.

“Haruuuuu-kuuun.”

Can you imagine how I felt when I heard that voice?

I must have been looking down. But I wasn’t looking at the ground. I wasn’t looking at anything, and I wasn’t thinking about anything either. I’d regressed to become a life-form without emotions or conscious thought. Her voice made me human again.

Yume.

Ohhh, it’s Yume.

I heard Yume’s voice.

Even then, the first thing I did was shut my eyes tight, and then cover them with my hands. I was hearing her voice, though, so shouldn’t I have been trying to plug my ears instead? Anyway, I closed my eyes and covered them. I was tired of being confronted with reality, but I probably wanted to hear Yume’s voice—my comrade’s voice. I strongly suspected that I might just be hearing things, but on the off chance that it was real, I couldn’t not listen.

“Haruuuuuu-kuuun!”

“Heyyy, Parupiro! Quit moping around, you dolt!”

However, as a consequence, I also heard something I didn’t want to. But I knew that if I was only hearing people’s voices because I wished they were there, then there was no way I would have heard Ranta’s voice. So if anything, that made it feel more real.

As I’d expected, Yume and Ranta hadn’t spent a moment apart. They’d arrived at Riverside Iron Fortress a few hours after me, when the sun had already set.

I remember Yume getting the clump of bird crap out of my hair with her bare hands. Ranta didn’t open his mouth, but the look he gave me said, Is this guy all right? When I mentioned I hadn’t entered the fortress yet, Ranta finally let his distrust show.

“You should’ve at least checked if Itsukushima and Poochie were here. What’s wrong with you, man? Are you an idiot? You are, huh? Yeah, you always have been an idiot, Parupiro.”

I couldn’t argue back. No matter what I said, I was afraid he’d see right through me and realize that I didn’t think Itsukushima or Poochie would be coming.

“But y’know...” Yume pointed at the birds lining the top of the walls. “...it sure is lookin’ like there might not be anyone inside.”

“What I’m trying to say is, even if there isn’t anyone, the obvious thing to do is to check to make sure. If we take a look inside for ourselves, we should be able to more or less figure out what went down here.”

Ranta argued back, Yume complained, and the two started arguing.

Maybe this was entirely because of Yume’s personality and manner of speech, but even when the two of them fought, it looked playful. It’s incredibly rare, but I still see scenes of them fighting in my dreams. When I do, I even find myself hoping they’ll keep going at it forever.

The sun was already setting, and it was getting darker by the hour. I don’t remember in detail what we talked about, but I guess that we must have settled on not investigating the fortress until the sun was up again. As I remember it, we camped out a short distance from the fortress, somewhere with a view looking down on the Jet River.

Ranta and Yume seemed exhausted, and fell into a deep sleep while I was standing watch.

I slept too at some point. But not for long.

Yume was lying on her side, and Ranta was holding on to her from behind. I have a clear memory of how the two of them looked sleeping that night.

After the sun rose, we entered Riverside Iron Fortress. From what we could see, there were no sekaishu inside, and the place was abandoned, like we’d thought. There were no survivors, but we found traces of the dead. The front courtyard, just inside the broken gates, was littered with bodies—no, it would be more accurate to call them scattered remains. The birds nesting on the fortress must have feasted on them. All that remained were the bones and equipment of the dead.

We spotted a familiar set of armor and a shield. They’d belonged to Tokimune, the leader of the Tokkis. I thought I must have been mistaken, but Ranta confirmed, “That’s Tokimune,” with surprising ease. Yume didn’t disagree with him. Then Ranta picked up a sword. It was large, probably more easily held in two hands than in one.

“Man...not Britney too.”

Britney was the former head of the Volunteer Soldier Corps office, and had been keeping the corps together after things had gone down in Alterna. He’d had green-dyed hair, and had even changed his eye color somehow. He had been a bit of an oddball, but also a capable paladin who had looked after us younger volunteer soldiers well. I found a skull with matted green hair stuck to it, but I very deliberately didn’t tell Ranta or Yume. Tokimune and Britney had died here. It took everything I had just to process that fact.

And they weren’t the only ones. How many volunteer soldiers had been lost? With the bodies in the state they were in, it wasn’t easy to make even a rough estimate, but it was more than a few. Probably more than ten.

“Doesn’t look like they were completely wiped out,” Ranta said, sounding like he was trying to convince himself.

I agreed with him on that point. There weren’t enough bodies for that.

The volunteer soldiers had taken a large number of casualties, and had found themselves in a disadvantageous situation. Then at some point they’d tried to withdraw from Riverside Iron Fortress. Maybe they’d had no choice but to run?

A fortress is a military facility built for defensive purposes. Yet Britney and Tokimune had died inside the fortress, not outside. The enemy, probably a massive amount of sekaishu, had forced their way in, and that had necessitated that the volunteer soldiers retreat. It was horrifying to think about. No matter how I pictured it, it was awful. I could only imagine an absolute disaster playing out.

This isn’t nice to say, but while it was one thing to have lost Britney, I couldn’t believe that Tokimune of all people was dead. Yeah, he’d been the type that, when the cards were down, he’d ignore any danger to save his comrades. But at the same time, even when he had found himself in a life-or-death situation, he had always managed to cut his way out. Somewhere in my head, I’d always thought of him as the kind of person who would never die. He’d had a natural cheer, but more than just being a positive guy, he’d also been quick to notice opportunities. Despite them having taken loads of risks as volunteer soldiers, Tokimune had never lost one of his comrades. Unlike me, who had never amounted to anything more than an utter fraud as a leader. We were nothing alike. Tokimune was the polar opposite of me. When people talk about a “true leader,” they mean a guy like Tokimune.

If Tokimune was dead, then it wouldn’t be surprising to discover that the Tokkis had been wiped out too.

The glasses-wearing priest who was an ex-warrior, Tada. Anna-san, who was a top-class motivator, and the life of the party. Inui with his ponytail and eye patch. The tall and athletic female mage, Mimori.

I’d had a lot of contact with the Tokkis. With Tokimune being the way he’d been, their team had been a cheerful group, each with their own radically different personalities, but strongly united. Once they had gotten into their groove, they’d been a group with incredible drive. For a gloomy guy like me, the energy that Tokimune had given off had never meshed well with my personality, but at least half of the reason for that had been because of jealousy. There’s no question that the Tokkis had been a likable bunch. Despite any complaints I had about them, they were the sort that always seemed to survive, no matter what happened. I think they had been fine as they were. The Tokkis had always enjoyed life. They had been people who deserved to live.

If Tokimune and the Tokkis were dead, then Grimgar was truly heartless. How was I supposed to have any hope in a nonsense world like this?

Maybe there never had been any hope.

Shouldn’t I have figured that out back in the beginning, when Manato had died? If this world was even remotely sane, then the people in it would die in a reasonable order. Manato shouldn’t have been the first to go. Why couldn’t it have been me? I’d have been a perfect first death. The same went for Moguzo. Why did Moguzo, out of all of us, have to die? Couldn’t it have been me?

In Grimgar, the people you’d miss most died first. That was probably why I had so much trouble dying. Those who couldn’t die had to watch the others go first.

It’s a tough role, in its own way. Hey, Manato. Moguzo. If we could trade places, I’d want to.

Even though I have deeply wrong thoughts like that, I have a talent for finding the boundary between life and death.

Ranta and Yume were trying to figure out which way the volunteer soldiers had fled—that is, their escape route. Obviously, they could’ve gone out the gates, but since these gates were broken, it seemed appropriate to assume that the sekaishu had flooded in through them. It was possible the surviving volunteer soldiers had used another route. Maybe Tokimune and Britney had fought to the death in the courtyard here to delay the enemy? In other words, buying time for their comrades. Ranta and Yume bounced competing theories off one another as they searched for that alternate route.

As for me, I was just following behind Ranta. I glanced around, looking at the corpses, but my head wasn’t working properly. I was listening to the two of them talk. But I had no opinions of my own. For as far back as I could remember, whenever I got quiet, people tended to assume that I was lost in thought, but in all honesty, I really wasn’t. If I had actually been thinking, I’d have been able to put it into words. When I had nothing to say, that meant I wasn’t thinking at all. But despite that, or maybe because I wasn’t thinking, I sensed that something was strange.

Ranta and Yume had decided that the path we were looking for was probably the secret passage in the seventh tower, and were heading in that direction. Actually, we were already almost there.

Yume took off running toward the entrance to the tower, and Ranta yelled “Hey!” or something like that as he chased after her.

I looked up. If you were to ask me why, I couldn’t tell you. But there must’ve been something that made me do it.

The towers of Riverside Iron Fortress, including the seventh, were all built the same, with hardly any distinguishing features. They were thick cylinders, with a roof like a pointed hat on top of them. The Iron Fortress part of the name came from the fact that the foundations of the walls and towers had been made by pouring a composite material like concrete into an iron framework. Aside from those foundations, the walls and towers of the fortress were just stonework constructions.

Someone was standing there, atop the seventh tower. Armor. They wore an ominous-looking suit of armor. However, that thing wasn’t human. Other than the armor, they were also wearing a long cloak, pitch black, and so long that it would trail on the ground behind them. But was that actually a cloak? No. No, it was not. It was a bunch of sekaishu. Dark sekaishu had gathered together, wrapping themselves around the suit of armor.

“Yume, Ranta!” I shouted immediately.

That armor. I recognized it.

Renji. Renji had been wearing it. He’d said it was a relic. Aragarfald, or something like that.

That’s a relic. Renji. Could that be Renji? Is he inside of it? Even Renji died? The Renji?

Either way, that thing was a night-clad one.

At first, I’d been completely distracted by their armor. I didn’t miss the fact that they were holding something in each hand, but that hadn’t been the focus of my attention.

However, a moment later, there was no way I could keep overlooking those two objects when I realized they were alive.

The night-clad one was holding a human in their right hand, and a doglike creature in their left.

I’d be lying if I said a horrifying suspicion didn’t cross my mind. No, it wasn’t just a suspicion, I was certain of it. But I made a deliberate choice to say nothing about what I had realized.

“Run! It’s a night-clad one! Retreat! Retreat!” I cried, racing in the direction of another tower.

Ranta and Yume followed me. As they did, the night-clad one leaped from the top of the seventh tower, their sekaishu cloak spreading like a pair of black wings.

We hid in the shadow of another tower. Why did all three of us stop there? Probably because it was eerily silent. We couldn’t even hear when that thing landed.

Ranta stuck his head out and pulled it back in just as quick. Moving his lips without a sound and making a few hand gestures, he let Yume and me know that the enemy was out there.

What were we supposed to do? I had absolutely no idea. If I were to try to think my way out of the situation we found ourselves in, I felt like I’d be crushed under the weight of realizing how screwed we were. That thing was coming after us, and they were going to find us sooner or later. Was Renji inside that night-clad one? Even if he wasn’t, if the night-clad one could use the power of that relic, the demon armor Aragarfald, we would be no match for them. It was hopeless, so we weren’t going to do anything. We were going to stay right where we were and wait. No, that wasn’t going to fly.

I held up all the fingers on my left hand, then I tapped my palm with the index and middle finger of my right hand, indicating the number seven. I then pointed downward with my right hand and made a quick forward motion before pointing back up. “Let’s flee through the secret passage in the seventh tower.” Ranta and Yume immediately understood what I was suggesting and nodded.

Even though I had their understanding, I was still hesitant. Was this okay? Was this honestly a good idea? Of course it wasn’t. We had to run, so I wanted to take the closest seemingly viable route. That was all this plan amounted to.

Ranta gestured to assert that Yume should take the lead, while I went second, and he brought up the rear. I didn’t know the area well, so I had no objection to that. Yume accepted it too.

Yume took off running as hard as she could, and I did my best to keep up with her. It was smooth sailing to the entrance to the seventh tower, and I remember feeling like I’d psyched myself up for nothing. But then I turned and saw the night-clad one about to attack Ranta.

If I had been in his position, I’d have given up. I’d probably have tried to buy a second, maybe two for my comrades to get away. Or rather, that would have been the only option left for me.

Ranta was different. He came to a sudden stop, looking like he was bracing himself for the night-clad one’s charge. But then a moment later, he was in a different spot, some distance away. He’d done more than just use the unorthodox moves typical of a dread knight to dodge the night-clad one’s attack. He’d mesmerized it, making it lose track of him for a second. In that time, Yume had made it through the door. I followed her.

“Personal skill—”

Ranta drew his katana, and struck the night-clad one. Its cloak of sekaishu blocked the blade, but Ranta instantly vanished. He hadn’t actually disappeared, of course. His contradictory move, attacking and retreating simultaneously, had just caused the illusion of him vanishing.

Ranta had developed his rare physical abilities and skill with a sword using a unique and extraordinary regimen of strength training combined with actual combat experience. As someone who knew what he had been like before, it was hard to believe how much he had grown. Maybe I just had no eye for that kind of thing? I don’t think I was any great judge of people, but who could have imagined him rising up to become a first-rate dread knight? It was almost like there were multiple Rantas, jumping around at random, then all rushing at the night-clad one. Even that probably wasn’t going to be enough to damage it, but that wasn’t what Ranta was aiming for. He was toying with the night-clad one. Ranta struck and moved away, struck and moved away again. He moved faster than the eye could see, and with timing that was hard to predict, all while gradually moving closer to the seventh tower.

Yume entered the tower without any apparent concern for Ranta. She trusted him implicitly, and knew he didn’t want or need her to worry about him. Could I ever trust people the way Yume did? Well, I did follow her example a moment later.

They called it a secret passage for a reason. The flight of stairs that started the passage had originally been walled off, but the stone blocks had been smashed in. Thanks to that, all we had to do was climb over the rubble. When we reached the bottom of the stairs, we found the entrance to a passage that was tall enough for someone of my height to enter it without having to duck.

Obviously, we waited for a little while in front of the passage, then once Ranta raced down the stairs to join us, we headed in.

It was pitch black inside. The three of us proceeded for a while in silence, pushing deeper and deeper into the darkness.

I feel like I never at any point worried about what would happen if the night-clad one pursued us into the passage. We couldn’t see, and there was no way to fight, so there was no point in feeling uneasy about it. Maybe I had accepted that in our circumstances the best thing that we could do was to push forward as much as we could. Or maybe I was wondering when to bring up what I had seen before. I had to tell them about what the night-clad one had been holding eventually. Even though I knew, I didn’t want to put it into words, and maybe that was keeping me from thinking.

Either way, the night-clad one didn’t catch us. If it did come after us, it must have turned back. We survived.

Yume, Ranta, and I.

I have a very clear memory of what was said in that dark passage.

“Master didn’t make it,” Yume said with tears in her voice.

“Yeah.” I didn’t see it, but I think Ranta put his arm around her shoulders. “That’s right. But listen. It’s not that he didn’t make it. Don’t talk like that. We’re here right now thanks to Itsukushima and Poochie. Right?”

I never knew he could sound so compassionate. Maybe it was because it was Yume. He wasn’t the kind of guy to be gentle to just anyone.

Was I able to say anything to Yume? I don’t think I was just quiet the whole time, but I doubt I did much more than agree with Ranta.

After all, I had believed that Itsukushima and Poochie had already died a while ago. Who would’ve guessed that they were still alive? Itsukushima and Poochie had gotten out of danger, and made it all the way to Riverside Iron Fortress. And faster than any of us had too.

But that had actually worked out in our favor. Because there had been another night-clad one at the fortress.

If I had arrived first and gone inside, maybe it would have gotten me. If that had happened, maybe Itsukushima and Poochie would have noticed something was wrong, and gotten out of there with Yume and Ranta.

Itsukushima and Poochie had died at Riverside Iron Fortress.

They died in my place.

That was all I could think.

I’m sorry. I wish I could apologize. I feel terrible. I was wrong. It was all my fault.

But who should I apologize to?

Itsukushima and Poochie are already gone. Nothing can come of saying sorry to the dead.

Then, to Yume or Ranta?

I couldn’t do that, and I shouldn’t.

In the end, I never got to apologize.

Even now, I think that it was my fault.

I wish I had died.

I should’ve died that day at Riverside Iron Fortress.