Grimgal of Ashes and Illusion - Volume 7 - Chapter 12

12. Kinuko-sama

“I’m dying! It hurts!” Ranta shouted as he used Leap Out to get in front of the enemy. “Clearly our 49th day is cursed!”

The enemy tried to turn towards Ranta. However, with excellent timing, Kuzaku pushed in with his recently-acquired shield in front of him, and prevented it from doing so.

“Grahhh!” Kuzaku shouted.

“Ngh...!” Ranta swung the black blade he had bought from the blacksmith into the enemy’s flank. “Of course, I meant it’s cursed for you, pal!”

While the lion dead one coughed and spewed blood from its terrifying maw, it wrapped its left arm around Ranta. Kuzaku was getting in the way of its right arm, so it couldn’t move quite the way it wanted to. Kuzaku wasn’t only interfering with its movements; he was shouting out and stabbing his sword into its guts, too.

Yume released her drawn bowstring. Her arrow flew. It struck the dead one in the forehead.

Nice one, Haruhiro wanted to congratulate her, but Yume cried out, “Mrrrow!” in consternation. She must have been aiming for the eyes, but missed. Still, she hadn’t been off by far.

Haruhiro kept a level head as he clung to its back, stabbing his short sword into the dead one’s neck. Its thick, stiff mane got in the way. He pulled his sword back, and stabbed again—No. He sensed it. Its body was filled with an abnormal strength.

Haruhiro let go and jumped away. “Get away from it for now!”

“’Kay!” Kuzaku shouted.

“Dammit!” Ranta yelled.

Kuzaku and Ranta both immediately followed Haruhiro’s command and pulled back. In that instant, the lion dead one let out a truly heart-chilling roar. It was a loud noise that seemed to grab everyone who heard it by the guts, messing them up inside. Even if they had been prepared, it would have been harsh. It made them want to cover their ears and scream Please, stop! In fact, Haruhiro, Kuzaku, Ranta, and Yume all cringed. Even Zodiac-kun, who was just idly floating around nearby, did. Merry did, too, but Shihoru, who was beside her with her mind keenly focused, was the only one who did not.

“Dark!” Shihoru cried.

When Shihoru called that name, the thing appeared as if coming out of a door that had opened up from an unseen world. The long, dark strings twisted into a spiral and took on a certain form. It was like a person. Just about the right size to fit in a human’s palm. Palm-sized darkness. It was an elemental.

After much trial and error, Shihoru had settled on this form. If you asked her about it, Shihoru would say it was still a work in progress, and that he must have a true form, one more appropriate for him.

Regardless, Dark had grown attached to Shihoru. That was how it looked to Haruhiro. After all, Dark appeared next to Shihoru’s face, and sat on her shoulder. That wasn’t all, either.

“Go!”

When Shihoru gave that order, Dark obeyed. He flew off of Shihoru’s shoulder with a mysterious whooshing cry, or maybe just a noise, as he hurtled towards the lion dead one.

Dark struck the lion dead one in the chest. There was no impact. He was sucked into its body. Did that do something? What had Dark caused to happen? That wasn’t absolutely clear. But, anyway, the lion dead one groaned and doubled over like it had taken a solid punch to the solar plexus, then dropped to a knee. Dark was having an effect on it.

Before Haruhiro could shout “Now!” Ranta was already charging in with Leap Out. He drew a figure-eight with his black blade and—no.

Ranta was drawing an infinity, not an eight.

“Infinite... Black Purgatory Dance!”

First an infinity, then an eight. The eight was followed by another infinity. After the infinity, an eight. He chained them. Chained and chained them.

The lion dead one wasn’t wearing any actual armor, but its body was protected with hard, dense fur, impact-absorbing fat, and thick muscles. Thanks to that, slashing attacks were practically ineffective against it. Yet still, Ranta slashed it. Never learning his lesson, he slashed and slashed like crazy. In the end, he stumbled backwards, short of breath.

“What about that...” Kuzaku stabbed the lion dead one in the belly again, right where he himself had stabbed it before, and twisted. “...was supposed to be infinite?!”

“Nguhhhhhhh!” The lion dead one writhed around, spewing blood.

“That’s Ranta for you!” Yume fired off one arrow after another.

She was using Rapid Fire. Three shots. The first shot missed, but the second landed a perfect hit on the lion dead one’s right eye, and the third shot pinged off of Kuzaku’s helmet.

“Whoa!” Kuzaku yelped.

“Meow?! S-Sorry ’bout that!”

“Bwahah!” Ranta quickly shot back at her. “That’s just Yume for you!”

“Shut up, stupid Ranta!”

“Ehe... It’s true, you’re too noisy... Shut up, Ranta. Forever... Ehehe...”

“Zodiac-kun! You’re basically telling me to die there, aren’t you?!” Ranta screamed.

“Auugh...!” The lion dead one tried to push Kuzaku away.

Kuzaku dug his heels in, standing his ground. He forced his longsword in even deeper, and twisted it. “Rahhh!”

Haruhiro jumped on the lion dead one from behind, stabbing his short sword into its back. He tore through the fur, flesh, and fat layers. His blade passed between its ribs—but it was no good. He didn’t reach its organs.

“Haru!” Merry called out to him, so Haruhiro decided to quietly put some distance between himself and the lion dead one. When facing an enemy of this level, a mere thief like Haruhiro was hardly ever going to be able to land a fatal blow. That was the safest assumption. If he could see that line, things would be different, but it wasn’t a thing he could see by trying to.

With a roar, the lion dead one tried using both hands and both legs to push Kuzaku away from it. Kuzaku was resisting, but the odds were against him in a test of pure strength.

“Die already!” Ranta whacked the lion dead one hard in the head with his black blade, but he still couldn’t cut it.

The lion dead one finally kicked Kuzaku, knocking him off balance.

“Guh!”

The lion dead one immediately turned and ran.

“You think you can get away?!” Ranta shouted, chasing after it. No, he only pretended to. Ranta made it two, three steps and then stopped, clicking his tongue. “We missed our chance to kill it! It’s because you’re all hopeless, you know that! If we’d had another of me, we could’ve taken it out!”

“...Yeah, just keep talking.” Haruhiro looked around the area, checking that there weren’t any other dead ones, then took a deep breath.

“Kehehe... If there were two of Ranta... this world would be a nightmare... Kehe... Kehehehe...” Zodiac-kun cackled.

“Whaddaya mean by that?!” Ranta hollered.

“Exactly what it sounded like,” Shihoru muttered.

“Zodiac-kun’s so kind.” Merry smiled coldly. “If anything, that was a generous assessment.”

“You peopleeeeee. What’d I ever do to youuuuuuuuu?!”

“You’ve been doin’ all sorts of stuff.” Yume puffed up her cheeks and plucked at the string on her bow. “Mrrrow. Was that a close one... You think?”

“Hard to say.” Kuzaku lifted the visor on his helmet, bending his neck. “I thought I could push through, but I couldn’t. It was like we were missing some decisive factor? Maybe?”

“But Shihoru’s magic was effective.” Haruhiro gave Shihoru a thumbs up.

“You think so?” Shihoru’s neck shrunk into her body with embarrassment. “I hope it was.”

“You were great.” Merry patted Shihoru on the back. “Creating magic in your own style. I could stand to learn from your example.”

“...Eh heh,” Shihoru giggled self-consciously.

“Thanks to me!” Ranta puffed up his chest. “It’s because I’m always showing off my freewheeling style! It was my influence! Clearly!”

“Kehe...”

“Wh-What, Zodiac-kun? If you’ve got something to say, then say it. We’re buds. No need to hold back on me now. —Wait, you’re vanishing?! Because of that?! Hold on, Zodiac-kun, come back, okay?! If you leave like that, it’s gonna be awkward for me when I summon you again, you know?!”

The lion dead one was a troublesome enemy that sometimes appeared in the Northwest Quarter of the City of the Dead Ones. Until a little while ago, they would have had no choice but to flee the moment it attacked, but now they could fight it on even footing. They had fought it a number of times, so they were getting used to it. However, factoring in the experience they had gained, it probably was okay to think that Haruhiro and the others were getting stronger.

In fact, their equipment had gotten better, too. Kuzaku had gotten himself a curved, trapezoidal shield—according to the blacksmith of Well Village, it was apparently called Gushtat—and, having gotten his hands on a pair of lightweight, sturdy gauntlets, Ranta had replaced his armor with a lighter, more ominous looking set. He was calling it his Death Armor. What a complete and utter moron.

As for Haruhiro, his cloak, leather armor, gloves, pants, and everything else had all gotten so ratty and tattered that they were beyond repair, so he had bought some nice, dark-colored replacements from the clothing and bag seller in Well Village. For a breastplate and such, he had gotten a matching set of leather pieces made from what, on closer inspection, seemed to be snake leather. He was quite fond of them. He’d had to have a pair of seven-fingered gloves reworked for his five-fingered hands, but he’d gotten so used to them now that they felt strangely familiar to him, and they were easy to use.

It seemed Yume had decided to increase her defense in a way that wouldn’t impede her ability to use her bow. She was wearing a number of different protectors here and there. They were probably made of bone and coated with a resin of some sort, but they really were light.

Shihoru’s hat and robe had also been badly frayed, so the girls had gone together to buy her something that looked suitable from the clothing and bag shop. They had done that, but it looked like it was a little tight in the chest area. Still, maybe the robe she’d had up until now had just been a little too loose-fitting.

Ranta whispered to Haruhiro and Ranta, quietly so that Shihoru couldn’t hear him for a change, “She wasn’t just hiding big ones. Those are some serious torpedo tits she’s rocking. I mean, man, she’s even more stacked than I thought.”

Honestly, Haruhiro agreed, but he still felt an urge to kill the guy for saying it.

As a priest, Merry had been hesitant to do it, but she’d disposed of her priest’s robe which was badly damaged. She’d looked for a white coat to replace it, but couldn’t find one, so she’d settled on a deep blue one instead. It was a good fit for her body type, and she looked good in it. She’d also acquired a staff with a head on it that looked like it would be painful to get hit with, but that’d been loot, not something she had bought.

Incidentally, they had all bought masks or face coverings from the mask shop, making the time they spent hiding out in Well Village somewhat more comfortable. They were also buying their daily necessities as the need arose. There were now far fewer things that they felt were missing in their lives.

Other than that, the most notable thing was Shihoru’s new magic. She had given form to the elemental she’d named Dark, which she could now control.

It seemed that the reason Dark resembled a shadow elemental was because Shihoru specialized in Darsh shadow magic. Elementals fed on a mage’s magical power in order to take form, and to exert their power. Because of that, the mage and elemental each directly influenced the other. Being a thief, Haruhiro didn’t really understand it, but it could be similar to what happened with a dread knight’s demon.

Anyway, Shihoru’s new magic, Dark, had only just been created and it was still a work in progress, so there was still all sorts of potential there.

Shihoru had chosen the path of Darsh magic, which specialized in support and interference spells, but she’d also picked up Falz magic as well in order to gain some destructive power, and she had dabbled in Kanon magic a little, too. Her path had taken a number of twists and turns. However, going from one thing to another was probably not what Shihoru had really wanted to do. She was an earnest sort, the type that would have wanted to pursue a single thing as far as she could take it.

Could Dark, perhaps, become that one thing for Shihoru? Haruhiro hoped so.

Their 49th day in this world ended, and the 50th began.

When they went into Well Village to wash their faces and get breakfast, Haruhiro and the others encountered him again.

“Oh ho!” Ranta jumped into the air. “It’s Unjo-san!”

Wearing a braided hat, this man who was like a walking arsenal with axes, swords, crossbows, and more hanging from his hip and backpack, was sipping at a bowl of bug soup. This was only the second time they had seen him, but he was unmistakable. It was Mr. Unjo.

When Mr. Unjo finished drinking the broth, he picked out the bugs with his fingers and ate them. Then, when the bowl was empty, he said, “Ruo keh,” returning it to the giant crab grocer before finally turning to Haruhiro and the others.

“You people, huh. Volunteer soldiers. You still live, do you?”

“Thanks to you!” Ranta rushed over and did a fist pump. “I mean, man, that City of the Dead Ones! When you told us about that place, you really helped us out! Ever since, our quality of life has been on a serious upswing! You’re the best, Unjo-san! Unjo-san for president! President...? Maybe king would be better? Well, whatever. Ehehehehehe. Would you like that, Your Excellency?! No, actually, how about Your Majesty?! You want that?! Is that what it’s gonna be?!”

“Man, you are seriously annoying...” Haruhiro fought off a pounding headache as he pushed Ranta aside and bowed his head in apology. “I’m sorry for our stupid, worthless piece of trash...”

Mr. Unjo grabbed the brim of his braided hat and pulled it down. He didn’t say a word. What did that mean? Was he angry, maybe...?

Ranta gulped audibly, and poked Haruhiro in the side. “Y-You moron. Th-This is your fault! Everything is!”

“Why...?”

“You’re the leader, damn it! That means everything’s your responsibility, you worthless chunk of smegma!”

With a glance back at Haruhiro, who was so exasperated he lacked the will to get properly angry, Mr. Unjo started walking.

Where was he going? To the general store that was beside the grocery store? Well, they called it a general store, but most of what the store had on display was junk. What was more, outside of the rare occasions when the lanky shopkeeper who dressed all in dark grey was outside, it wasn’t open for business.

The owner wasn’t around right now. The door to the building was still closed.

Once before, Ranta had said something stupid about a test of courage, or something like that, and knocked on the door. There had been no response.

The general store was the most mysterious shop in all of Well Village. For a start, Haruhiro and the others had just started calling it a general store on their own. It might not even be a store at all.

Mr. Unjo did not knock on the general store’s door. He suddenly opened it. It was a sliding door. Mr. Unjo silently entered.

—Wait, huh? Haruhiro thought, startled. Is that okay?

“Wh-What should we do?” Ranta had taken shelter behind Haruhiro at some point.

“...What do you mean, ‘what’? For now, just get away from me.”

“Hey, man, I’m not clinging to you because I like it. Don’t get the wrong idea, moron.”

“Hmm.” Kuzaku pressed on his neck and twisted it around. “I’m interested, you know. Truth be told.”

“Yeah,” Yume said idly. “Let’s try goin’ in.”

Well, we’re inside Well Village. It’s not like we’ll get killed, reasoned Haruhiro. Probably.

The door to the general store was still open. Haruhiro first tried peeking inside. He was in for a bit of a surprise.

There wasn’t a single window, and the walls that were dimly illuminated by a lamp were covered in—Were those stone tablets? Or clay tablets, maybe? Either way, the sight of a great many rectangular tablets, large and small, with symbols and pictures carved into them, was overwhelming for Haruhiro. Were those symbols letters? Some of the pictures were even colored.

Even seated on a chair in the back, the lanky shopkeeper looked long and thin. Mr. Unjo laid that large backpack of his down on the ground. It looked like he was trying to retrieve something from inside it. It turned out to be a stone tablet.

“Wowie...” Yume crouched down at the door. “What’s all that? It’s amazin’.”

Ranta raised the visor on his helmet and looked all around, staring. “Treasure, huh...?”

“Is this all there is?” Shihoru looked around the room, then sighed. “Though, in a way, it might be a treasure...”

“This might not be a general store,” Merry said quietly. “It could be a museum, maybe?”

“The stuff looks old enough for it to be.” Kuzaku wandered inside. He started reaching out to touch one of the stone tablets, but then pulled his hand back. “Maybe touching them’s a bad idea.”

The lanky shopkeeper accepted the stone tablet from Mr. Unjo, placing it on the desk and holding both his hands over it.

Haruhiro shuddered a bit. He’d seen something a little scary. The lanky shopkeeper’s hands. They had five fingers, but on the palms—If Haruhiro’s own eyes weren’t playing tricks on him, there were eyes there. The lanky shopkeeper was using those eyes to scrutinize the stone tablet.

Mr. Unjo turned back to Haruhiro. “Here, there are no books. No paper books. There are records left, though. On stone, on clay. On tablets. The eyehand sage, Oubu, is a researcher. He collects tablets. If a tablet is of value, he will buy it from you.”

The eyehand sage, Oubu, presumably meant the lanky shopkeeper. When the sage Oubu’s hands moved away from the tablet, the sage fished through the desk drawers and pulled out some black coins. They were big. Not small, or medium-sized. Large coins. Not just one. Two of them.

Two large coins meant 2 rou. Depending on the store they went to, or rather the person, the value of them could range anywhere from 20 to 50 ruma. It was a fortune.

Taking the two coins from the sage Oubu, Mr. Unjo stuffed them unceremoniously into his backpack. “Ruo keh.”

“Avaruu seha,” the sage Oubu responded, his hands returning to the stone tablet on the desk. With those eyehands, he was closely examining the newly-acquired tablet.

“Lumiaris and Skullhell.” Mr. Unjo suddenly mentioned two unexpected names as he pointed to one of the stone tablets. “The battle between gods is depicted.”

“Ohh...!” Ranta rushed over, pressing his face up close to the stone tablet. “He’s serious! This guy on the right, his face looks just like Skullhell’s symbol!”

“Lumiaris is always just represented by the hexagram, never drawn, but—” Merry seemed intrigued too, and squinted at the stone tablet. “The woman on the left, that’s Lumiaris...?”

This stone tablet was oblong and rectangular. On the right-hand side was a man with a skull-like face, and on the left was a long-haired woman. The man held a large scythe in his right hand, a sword in his left, and he had only one leg. The woman was naked, with a large sphere in her right hand and a tiny sphere in her left. There was a rainbow on her back.

The right half of the background was night, and the left half was day. There were many tiny creatures at the bottom. They were each aligned with the man or woman, and they were fighting one another. They were running each other through with swords, there were arrows flying back and forth, and many of the creatures could be seen to have collapsed. There was a bloody battle underway.

“It happened here,” Mr. Unjo said in a low voice. “Lumiaris and Skullhell were here. Here in Darunggar.”

“Darung...gar?” Haruhiro asked as he looked to the other stone and clay tablets.

“That is what those here call this place.”

“The God of Light, Lumiaris, and the Dark God, Skullhell, fought here in Darunggar...” Shihoru said cautiously. “Long ago, the people of Darunggar sided with either Lumiaris or Skullhell, and they fought... Is that it?”

“Who won... I wonder?” Kuzaku rubbed the hexagram carved into his own armor.

“Hey, man.” Ranta snorted. “Look how dark it is here. Obviously my beloved Lord Skullhell won the day, right?”

“But light magic works here, too?” Merry immediately rebutted. “If Lumiaris lost, isn’t it strange that her power still reaches here?”

“You can say that, but it goes for my dark magic, too, you know? Well, both of them feel like they’re less than half as effective as normal, though.”

“Well, then.” Yume was looking at another stone tablet. “It must’ve been a tie, don’tcha think?”

“So, now they’ve both gone to Grimgar?” Haruhiro tilted his head to the side. “...What would you call a group of gods, anyway? A band? No. A crowd? No. A party? No. Maybe a pantheon...?”

“The course of the battle remains unknown.” Mr. Unjo shouldered his backpack. “The eyehand sage, Oubu, says that he does not know. He is investigating that. Regardless, Lumiaris and Skullhell left Darunggar. Darunggar is a godless world.”

“They left...” Haruhiro tugged the hair on the back of his head a bit. “—Wait, where’d they leave from?”

Shihoru gulped. “There’s... a path, somewhere? Without a path from Darunggar to Grimgar, they couldn’t have left... right?”

“That means one thing!” Ranta shouted. “We can get home, right?!”

Kuzaku glanced at Mr. Unjo. “If we could get back, wouldn’t he have already done so?”

“Oh, yeah.” Yume let out a deep breath. “With Konjo-san still bein’ here, that’s probably right, huh...”

“You mean Unjo-san, okay?” Haruhiro corrected her, then got back on track.

Really, he wasn’t all that shocked. He had been thinking, I wanna go home. It’d be nice if we could, but lately he had started to feel, Well, if we can’t get back, that’s fine, too.

If they became unable to find any leads on how to get back after one hundred, two hundred days of being here, they would have to start working under the assumption they were going to have to live out their lives here for real. They would put down roots in Darunggar. By starting families, for instance? Of course, that would be something they’d naturally start to consider. It was probably an important thing. Haruhiro couldn’t excuse himself from it, saying, I’m the leader. If anything, as the leader, he needed to take the initiative.

There was no guarantee he wouldn’t end up confessing.

No, that’s not likely, huh? I can’t, right? Or rather, what’s a confession? What am I gonna confess? To whom? I don’t know what I mean.

While Haruhiro was asking those meaningless questions to himself, Mr. Unjo left the sage Oubu’s lab, which was not a general store at all. He could have said something first, but this was Mr. Unjo, so it was hard to blame him, Haruhiro supposed.

Haruhiro and the others left the lab, too, and saw Mr. Unjo was heading towards a different building. It was the largest building in Well Village, made from piled stones, with glass windows. In Haruhiro’s experience, there was always light leaking out from the glass windows. There had to be someone living there. Or so he’d always assumed, but he had never seen whoever lived there.

Mr. Unjo had entered the building last time, too. Haruhiro remembered that. He hadn’t seen anyone else going in or out.

Mr. Unjo opened the door, glancing to Haruhiro and the others. Follow me, he seemed to be saying. Having interpreted it that way, Haruhiro and the others followed Mr. Unjo into the building.

Haruhiro got goosebumps. It was a very strange feeling.

Where is this place? wondered Haruhiro.

The world called Darunggar. Well Village. It didn’t feel like either of those. This place was different.

Unlike the other buildings in Well Village, this one had a proper floor, and there was a carpet laid out. There were shelves. There was a single table. There were five chairs. It looked like there was another room in the back. On either side of the glass window, there were curtains. There were candlesticks sitting around here and there. Every one of them was lit. Four of the chairs were placed around the table. There was just one in the center of the room.

There, in the middle of it all, she was sitting.

She was human. Wearing a red dress. With white socks, black shoes, a red ribbon, blonde hair, and blue eyes. She looked like a young girl with pale skin.

That was what he thought at first. He quickly realized that wasn’t the case.

“...A doll?” Haruhiro blinked and took another look.

Why had he thought she was human? She was well-made, but clearly old, and her skin was cracked here and there. Her eyes were left wide open. But her hair seemed to have been combed, and while the colors of her outfit had faded somewhat, she wasn’t torn or frayed anywhere.

“Hold on...” Ranta was speechless.

It wasn’t just that doll and the furniture. This room was overflowing with many unique and different things. On the shelves, the top of the table, and even the floor. What was more, though it wasn’t quite all of them...

This, and that, and this, and that, it’s all familiar.

The picture frame-like thing leaning up against the wall. That round thing sitting on the table. The thick, rectangular thing. The thing with two disc-like objects connected with a band-like thing. The thin, rectangular object that looked like it would fit in his hand. The board-like thing with lots of buttons on it. The object with glass on the front, which was a rectangle with rounded corners.

I’ve seen them. Probably. Most likely.

He knew he must have. And yet, his confidence was starting to waver. It rapidly diminished. He’d seen them before? Really? How could he say that for sure?

He didn’t even know. He couldn’t recall their names, or when and where he’d seen them. He couldn’t remember, but... How could he say he’d seen them before? What evidence did he have?

Still, there were things there he could firmly identify in there. There were some pairs of glasses. One was black-rimmed; one was metal-framed. Another one had tortoise shell rims. The lenses were broken, or lost in some cases, but they were clearly glasses.

The shelves had books on them, too. However, they weren’t like the books he’d seen in Grimgar. They were thinner, and many were small. There were also cans, and clear containers. But though they were clear, they didn’t seem to be glass.

Mr. Unjo laid his backpack down on the ground and pulled something out from inside it. It was white, a small ball-like object. When Mr. Unjo laid it on the table, there was a hard sound.

The ball didn’t roll. It seemed its surface was bumpy.

“Wha... What is that thing?” Kuzaku asked. “I know it... or I feel like I should, but what is it?”

“Who knows?” Mr. Unjo slowly looked around the room. He might have been checking how far the candles had burned down. “I don’t. Not me. But they’re different, I can tell that much. The things in this room are different.”

“...Different.” Shihoru shook her head. “I feel the same way. They’re different.”

Merry pressed a hand against her chest. “Did you gather all of these?”

“No,” Mr. Unjo replied immediately. “When I first came, this room was here.”

“Meow...” Yume picked up the thin, rectangular object off the table. When she stroked it with her finger, the dust wiped away, and it was awfully smooth. Yume tilted her head to the side and looked at it funny. “...Nwuh?”

“Did the villagers start the collection, then?” Ranta looked at the doll, seemingly creeped out. “Does no one live in this house? Other than that girl?”

Mr. Unjo gestured towards the doll with his chin. “Don’t touch Kinuko.”

“Kinu...ko... Wait, you mean the doll?”

“Everyone calls her that.”

“Hmm,” Ranta said. “Well, she doesn’t look like a Kinuko to me. More of a Nancy, if anything.”

“She doesn’t feel like a Nancy,” Shihoru disagreed. “Not a chance.”

“Well, what does she feel like, huh?! Speak up, torpedo tits!”

“Torp...” Shihoru covered her breasts with her arms. “...M-Maybe an Alice? Something like that...”

“Alice, huh? Hmm.” Ranta crossed his arms. “Either way, Kinuko’s right out.”

“The gods have left Darunggar.” Unjo lifted up his backpack. “She is their replacement. In this village, Kinuko is worshiped. She came from another world... they say.”

“True enough...” Haruhiro nodded. “She doesn’t look like anything from this world. Yeah. Still, that said, if you were to ask me if she was from Grimgar—”

“Not a chance.” Yume was still fiddling with the thin, rectangular object. “That’s true, but Yume, she’s got this mysterious feelin’, y’know. It’s all so nostalgic, somehow. Even though she ain’t got no clue what this thing’s supposed to be, she’s feelin’ like she knows. Weird...”

“Foreign objects are worshiped, too,” said Unjo. “If you find something out there that feels right, bring it here. Offer it to Kinuko.”

“You mean, um...” Ranta was always vulgar and without class. “For free?”

Mr. Unjo just gave a low snort and didn’t answer the question.

Haruhiro bowed his head a bit. “...I’m sorry about him. Seriously.”

“Huh? What’re you apologizing for, Parupiroooo? You a moron, or something? Yeah, you’re a moron, huh.” Ranta was unrepentant. “Well, y’know, I guess it works like that. Even if there’s no money in it, he’s saying Kinuko’s a god. Maybe we can expect some sort of boon? That’d make it worth doing. Yep. Yep. If we find anything, let’s bring it back here.”

“...But still.” Kuzaku was crouched down in front of the picture frame-like object. “Why is all this stuff here? Or is ‘why’ the question to ask? What is it? I can’t say it all that well, but isn’t it weird?”

Haruhiro could understand what Kuzaku wanted to say. He understood, but couldn’t put it into words very well. It was frustrating not being able to put it into words, and he thought it was really weird.

“We’re searching for a way back to our original world.” Shima’s words came back to him.

A way back. To their original world.

Haruhiro’s head hurt. In his temples—no, deeper inside—he felt a heavy, yet sharp pain. There was something there. He couldn’t help but feel that way. But his hands couldn’t reach it. It was inside his head, after all. He couldn’t jab a finger inside and fish around. Oh, if only he could!

“Unjo-san,” Haruhiro said.

“What?”

“Unjo-san, you—Do you ever think about wanting to return to our original world, or anything like that?”

“‘Original world.’” Mr. Unjo parroted the words back at him, then fell silent.

“Wait...” Merry looked at Haruhiro from behind her mask. “By our original world, you don’t mean Grimgar?”

“...Huh?” Shihoru covered her mouth. “Not Grimgar, our original...”

Yume looked up to the ceiling. “...Fwhuh?”

“Original—” Kuzaku was deep in thought. “Our original...”

“Hey, hey, hey. What do you mean, original?” Ranta tried to laugh, but stopped. “...What? We came from some other world before we were in Grimgar... Is that it?”

“If we didn’t, then where did we come from?” Merry asked, as much to herself as anyone else. “I don’t remember anything from before, but—we had to be somewhere, that much is certain. There’s no way we were just born looking like this.”

“Where did we even come from?” Shihoru’s voice was trembling a little. “By where did we come from, I mean... in my memories, I recall—I asked Haruhiro-kun, ‘Where is this place?’”

“...Um,” the girl behind him timidly asked, “where is this, do you think?”

“Look, asking me isn’t going to help,” Haruhiro was pretty sure he had answered.

“...Right, of course. Um, d-does anyone... know? Where is this place?”

Shihoru, Haruhiro remembered. That’s right. That was Shihoru. But where were we?

“We were lookin’ at Mr. Moon.” Yume clapped her hands together. “He was all red. That sure was surprisin’.”

“Ahh,” said Braids as she seemed to notice it, too. She blinked repeatedly, then chuckled. “Mr. Moon is red. That’s super pretty.”

Yume. That had been Yume. He could remember. Right. At that point, they’d noticed the moon. It had been ruby red, somewhere between a crescent and a half moon.

Why’s it red? he’d thought. A red moon had seemed weird.

Where had they been?

“...The hill?” Haruhiro murmured.

They’d been atop the hill next to Alterna. There were rows of graves, and Manato and Moguzo were buried there. They were there... and Choco, too.

Choco. Choco...? Kuzaku’s comrade. A thief. One of the junior volunteer soldiers. She’d fallen in the battle at Deadhead Watching Keep.

—Was that all? He didn’t know. Something was bugging him. Like he’d forgotten something...?

Big eyes. With bags under them. Pouty lips. A girl with a bob cut.

Choco.

Kuzaku’s comrade... She’d died. He’d never see her again.

“We were there on the hill.” Haruhiro looked to his comrades. “...That’s right, isn’t it? At the very least, Shihoru, Yume, Ranta—and Manato and Moguzo were there, too. Kikkawa. Renji. Ron. Sassa. Adachi. Chibi-chan, too. They were there. On that hill. We saw the red moon. Kuzaku, Merry, how was it for you?”

“The hill...” Merry mumbled to herself absently. “...I remember it. Only vaguely, though. I think my first memory is probably of the hill next to Alterna.”

“Me too, I think.” Kuzaku nodded. “It’s sort of an... Oh, yeah, I was there. With them. Dunno what we talked about, though...”

“What a coincidence.” Even Mr. Unjo chimed in, smiling slightly. “I, too, remember seeing the red moon on that hill. ‘The moon is red,’ I thought. ‘How creepy’...”

“...Isn’t that weird?” Haruhiro pulled back one of the chairs around the table and sat down in it. “That we appeared at that hill, I mean. I mean... That’s strange. It really is. No matter where we were before we came to Grimgar, if I think about it normally, uh—There was a tunnel-like place. Something like that, which we must have gone through, right? Then we appeared... on the hill.”

“There was a tower.” Mr. Unjo suddenly took off his braided hat. His close-cropped hair had gone half-white. Though the lower half of his face was hidden by his scarf, everything from his eyes up was exposed. He had a pronounced forehead, and looked to be a man in his forties or fifties. Placing his braided hat on the table, Mr. Unjo took a seat, too. “If my memory is correct, it was the ‘Forbidden Tower.’”

“The tower with no entrance or exit...” Shihoru’s entire body was shivering at this point. “I never knew what it was for... I thought it was weird. For all that time...”

“Could it be—” Ranta sat down on the ground. “Maybe we came out of that tower, don’t you think?”

“Even though there’s no entrance or exit?” Merry asked, doubtfully.

“Hmm...” Ranta knocked on his own head. “There it is. That’s the problem. But, you know, it’s weird if no one can go in or out. It’s meaningless. There’s gotta be a hidden door somewhere, right?”

“Hiyomu’d probably know, don’tcha think?” Yume said. “Hiyomu, she led us from the hill to Bri-chan’s place in Alterna, y’know.”

“It was like that for me, too.” Merry nodded.

“Yeah.” Kuzaku raised his hand slightly. “Me, too.”

“For me—” Mr. Unjo pressed his brow. “It was a man, I think. ...‘Call me Saa,’ he told us. Who is this Bri-chan?”

“Let’s see,” Haruhiro answered. “He’s the office chief for Red Moon, the Alterna Frontier Army’s Volunteer Soldier Corps. His name’s Britney.”

“Britney.” Mr. Unjo’s eyes went wide. “...Was this a man who acted like a woman? With light blue eyes.”

“...You know him?”

“I know him. His real name is Shibutori.”

“Shibutori?!” Ranta exclaimed. “Bri-chan’s name is Shibutori?!”

“Shibutori was from a younger generation,” Mr. Unjo said. “Compared to me. He’s the chief of the Volunteer Soldier Corps Office now?”

“Um, Unjo-san,” Haruhiro hesitantly asked. “How long has it been since you came to Darunggar again?”

“Five thousand, six hundred and seventy-six times,” Mr. Unjo said with a far off look in his eye. “Since I started counting, that is. That is the number of times the dark night has broken, and the pale morning has come.”

“...Five thousand six hundred—”

Was the length of one day in Darunggar equal to a day in Grimgar? Was it different? That much wasn’t clear, but if they were the same—Mr. Unjo had spent a full fifteen years and two hundred and one days here in Darunggar.

“Before now, have you seen any other, um... humans like us?” Haruhiro ventured.

“None. This is the first time. You people are the first.”

“Seriously...?” Even Ranta sounded pained by that. “That’s... That’s... Seriously, uh, that’s gotta have been pretty tough, huh. Seriously...”

“I’ve gotten used to it.” Mr. Unjo lowered his eyes to the table. “...I was used to it. I couldn’t return, anyway. I had long since given up. Life here is not so bad. A man’s home is his castle. The things that seem strange become normal. You learn the language, too. I have acquaintances here. Your language, it is nearly foreign to me. I’ve forgotten half of it. As we speak, I remember. Like this. But, either way, I cannot return. You people prepare yourselves for that, too. That hill. The forbidden tower. None of it matters. The hidden door. Even if it exists, you cannot find it. You cannot prove it exists. Live here. That is the only option. Until you die, live. No matter where you are, it’s the same. That is all there is for us.”

“It’s not just us.” Shihoru choked the words out. “Lala and Nono... A pair who were far more experienced and skilled than us came to Darunggar, too. Besides, it’s not like we came here directly from Grimgar.”

“Where?” Mr. Unjo jabbed his right finger into the table. “Where did you people enter Darunggar from?”

It would be hard for Haruhiro to say he remembered clearly. The distance and direction they’d traveled was kind of a blur. Even so, Haruhiro explained in as much detail as he could, but without making it needlessly complex, the sequence of events by which they had traveled from the Dusk Realm to Darunggar, and then how they had reached Well Village.

“Upstream...” Mr. Unjo laughed, as if in amazement. “You people have good luck. It’s a miracle you were all right.”

From what he told them, the forest north of Well Village was home to the yegyorns—which, according to Mr. Unjo, meant “mist moths”—a species of poisonous moth. Their poison was intensely powerful, and it took only an instant to make most living creatures faint in agony. However, a sort of weasel-like creature called a getaguna was the one exception. Those creatures had resistance to yegyorn poison, and the yegyorns wouldn’t even attack them in the first place.

Yegyorns would swarm their prey and knock them unconscious, at which point the getagunas would rush in and devour the innards. The yegyorns drank their prey’s blood, then laid their eggs in the flesh. In time, the eggs would hatch. The rotten flesh would provide them sustenance as they grew, until eventually they emerged as moths and took flight.

Yegyorns were small, only the size of the tip of your baby finger. They were fundamentally impossible to avoid in the dark forests of Darunggar, and by the time you noticed them, you’d have already been bitten.

In fact, Mr. Unjo said that the dose of poison from one of them wasn’t so big of a deal, but where there was one, you could expect there were hundreds more nearby, so you would be bit many times in quick succession.

There were yegyorns in the river to the north, too. Furthermore, along the river there were tobachi—which apparently meant “nasty,” or “hard to deal with”—a group of creatures that specialized in sneak attacks lurking all over the place, so caution was necessary. There were many types of tobachi, and it was more a collective name for the fierce, carnivorous creatures that lived along the river.

Naturally, tobachi often fell prey to the yegyorns and getagunas.

Other than that, there were ape-faced creatures called gaugai—these were probably what the party called inuzarus—which were spread out over a wide area. They were omnivorous, but their favorite meal was getaguna.

The moth forest, Adunyeg, north of Well Village, was incredibly dangerous, and people with good sense wouldn’t go in there.

The way Mr. Unjo told it, if they planned to cross the Adunyeg to return to the Dusk Realm, they had better be prepared to die trying. Whether it took three days, two days, or one day, Mr. Unjo couldn’t imagine traveling through the Adunyeg without encountering yegyorns. And if they encountered them, that would be the end. There were times when one or two yegyorns would wander into Well Village, and when that happened there was always a panic, he told them.

“W-Well, aren’t you glad we didn’t go and find out?” Ranta gulped. “Well, not that returning to the Dusk Realm’d do us any good. That place was crazy dangerous in its own way. Still, I’ll bet you Lala and Nono aren’t doing so hot, probably. I mean, I can’t imagine they’re as lucky as I am. They’ve gotta be dead. They used us as much as they could and then threw us away, though, so I’ve gotta say they had it coming...”

“Anyway, they haven’t come to this village, right?” Kuzaku said.

“Probably not.” Mr. Unjo was starting to sound pretty darn fluent. “Still, that said, there are other villages. Or towns rather than villages.”

Naturally, it would only make sense if there were. It would be strange and unnatural if this was the only village left after the clash between Lumiaris and Skullhell.

But Haruhiro was shocked.

“Whaa—” Haruhiro was at a loss for words. He traded glances with each of his comrades.

“Mrr.” Yume pressed her hands against both her cheeks. “So there’re towns...”

“Wh-Where’re they at?!” Ranta corrected himself. “Wh-Where, pray tell, might we locate them, good sir?!”

“...Pray tell?” Shihoru’s voice was dripping with loathing.

“I wouldn’t mind telling you people.” Mr. Unjo put on his braided hat. “The reason we can’t return to Grimgar. While I do, I can take you to the town of Herbesit, too. That is only if you wish me to, though.”