Majo no Tabitabi - Volume 15 - Chapter 1.19

CHAPTER 1 STORY 19

The World Through His Eyes

That day, a new piece by a famous artist in a certain country to the east debuted in an art gallery.

Now, I’m not someone who is very knowledgeable about art, so as soon as I laid eyes on his painting, which was hanging in an extremely expensive-looking gold frame, the only reaction I could produce was a worthless “Ah, it’s a good resemblance!”

However, to the people who lived in that country, that one painting seemed to contain all sorts of meanings. Many voices flew past one another in the crowd of dark-haired viewers that had formed in front of the painting.

“I was excited to hear that he had finally painted something after several years, but this… It’s a disappointment.”

“It’s a beautiful painting, as always. This witch wearing a vain expression is especially wonderful.”

“I thought it was great that I would get to see a new piece after so long, but what is this? He’s gone astray.”

“Well, this route is splendid, too!”

“It’s a means of progress. Just what you would expect from someone who has always done innovative stuff.”

“Did you say ‘progress’? You must have meant regression.”

In short, it garnered mixed reviews.

The artist’s name was Coulomb. He was a prodigy who was judged to be the best painter in the country despite his youth. His paintings were characterized by a particularly bold use of color…or so I’d heard. That’s what was written about him on the placard.

Coulomb’s past works were lined up in a row to the side of his new painting. Sure enough, all of them showed a bold use of color, bold enough that even I, in my ignorance about painting, was at least able to come up with a worthless reaction like “Ah, how colorful!”

But what about the new painting?

Hanging on the wall on the other side of the crowd of people was a single painting entitled The Ashen Witch. A lone witch wearing a black robe and a pointed hat, as well as a star-shaped brooch, was sitting by a window. She was letting her long gray hair flutter in the wind and wearing a vain-looking expression. She appeared to be simply sitting there, bored.

I could see how the painting didn’t seem like the work of the artist Coulomb.

There wasn’t the slightest use of any bold colors in the new painting. The Ashen Witch had been painted using only white and black and pale gray.

It did look like it was a departure, but I could also see how he seemed to be trying something new—that was probably precisely why the picture was getting mixed reviews.

“……”

Well, leaving all that aside, let’s turn our eyes to the painting once more. Even if we skip over everything about it being a departure and whatnot, it is a lovely painting. There’s a fair and beautiful witch right there.

By the way, who on earth could have been the model for that painting?

That’s right, it was me.

This all started when I first came to the country. That was about a week ago.

As I wandered carelessly around town, I grew disheartened, and rightly so.

“…What’s going on? This whole place is filthy rich?”

Just from walking down the street a little, it was obvious that the people of this country were fairly well-off and that they put an excessive amount of effort into the arts.

For example, take the bookstore. The exterior looked like an art gallery. A bronze statue of a young boy reading a book while walking was standing in the entryway.

Are you endorsing reading while walking?

For another example, take the butcher shop. Taxidermy animals were lined up around the entryway. In addition to a cow, a pig, and a chicken, there was also a sheep and a boar, a horse, and even a dog.

…A dog?

Add the fact that every store had, as a matter of course, paintings hanging up on the walls.

Even in a furniture store that I somehow wound up visiting (for some reason, the exterior was modeled after an enormous cupboard), they still had paintings on display.

“……”

There was some dark red substance spread thickly over the canvas. The coloring made it look like someone had tried their very best to vent their anger through the painting. The title of it was Fair Weather Skies, which was pretty boring.

Was the person who painted this a descendant of the devil or something?

When I averted my gaze downward, trying to escape from the sinister painting, I saw the signature of a man named Coulomb inscribed on it and felt worn out all over again.

It was a name I had seen over and over since coming to the country.

The majority of the shops I visited were decorated with his paintings. They had been painted irresponsibly, one being bright red despite bearing the title Ocean, and another being a deep blue color despite bearing the title Forest.

Why on earth are these sorts of paintings popular?

“Yoo-hoo! Miss, are you interested in this painting?”

While I was standing there in a daze, I was caught by the shopkeeper. But this was convenient for me.

Let’s ask our question straight out, shall we?

“…Tell me, exactly what is good about this painting? I have absolutely no clue what the appeal is.”

“Well! Imagine not understanding the appeal of this painting… I take it, miss, that you’re not from around here?”

“I’m a traveler.”

“I knew it!” The shopkeeper gave an exaggerated nod. “The thing about this painting, you see, is that it’s bright red even though it depicts fair skies. The novelty of it is magnificent! Although I don’t suppose an amateur who knows little about art could possibly understand.”

That’s not really much of an explanation…

“This is a furniture store, right? Why do you have paintings here?”

“Well, that’s because I’m someone who loves art above anything else, of course!”

“Huh… But this painting—it doesn’t match the atmosphere of your shop at all, does it? There are paintings in every shop, but they’re just on display. At least, that’s how it feels.”

This was a question that had been fermenting in my mind since I first arrived in this country, and it had been bubbling there the whole time I was sightseeing.

When I said this, the shopkeeper let his true opinion show for the first time.

“I don’t care about the atmosphere or whatever. As long as I have a famous and wonderful painting, that’s good enough for me. If you must know why, it’s because it’s the only thing that can show people my store is doing well! Customers come in to shop at stores that are doing well! And then I can buy another new painting! Wonderful!”

“……”

I left the store, and as I was walking down the street, I thought that this was a very peculiar country.

Initially, I had thought it must be a rich country, but apparently that wasn’t the case.

Instead, I got the sense that there were many people there who loved gaudy things.

I couldn’t sense any of the placidity characteristic of the wealthy in the people living there. Everywhere, throughout the country, I could see that people were trying to show off by displaying fancy art.

“……”

Well, to put it simply, it’s a place with lots of vain people, huh?

Once I changed my way of looking at things, the appearance of the country changed as well. For example, I saw that there were vain people even at the street stalls.

Every conceivable thing was there, at those shops sandwiched in between the flashy buildings.

The street stalls selling vegetables were especially strange and were filled with enormous vegetables the likes of which I had never seen, oddly shaped and defective-looking. However, here in this country, they were apparently quite rare and valuable, and the stalls were doing booming business.

Also, there were many colorful mushrooms on display as well, but I was pretty sure that, regardless of their rarity or their value, they were quite poisonous.

I continued down the street that was lined with stalls for a while, until a fruit shop came into view. But the things being sold there were not normal.

I came to a stop in front of the shop.

There were strangely colored fruits on display. An apple, but it was bright blue. A banana, but it was colored like a peach. A peach, but it was pitch-black.

It really was like—

“These fruits look like they were painted, don’t they?”

That’s how it seemed.

However, the shop owner shook his head. “Nah, no way, missy. These’re rare types of fruits.”

“Oh?”

As a test, I picked up a (bright red) orange and scraped at it with my finger.

Scratch, scratch.

“Ah, hey, knock it off! You’re gonna damage the merchandise!”

The shop owner snatched the red orange from me in a panic. When I looked at the finger that had done the scratching, it had faint traces of red stuck to it.

……

Shameful…

“—Oh, doesn’t that banana look good?!”

A man came to stand beside me as he made this puzzling comment. He was taller than I was and had a slender build. He looked to be about in his mid-twenties. He must have been in the middle of a shopping trip, because he was holding bags in both hands.

The shopkeeper, who had been scowling at me, abruptly changed his attitude with the arrival of a new customer and replied, “Yes, and it’s not just the bananas! All of these are rare fruits that I’ve just recently acquired.”

“I see. It’s no wonder I thought they were a little oddly colored.”

I think it’s more than a little.

“How about this peach over here? A pitch-black peach is a rare sight, surely?”

“Hmm… It doesn’t look all that tasty to me.”

“Don’t you worry, sir. The flavor is just like a normal peach.”

Well, he did just paint the colors on, after all.

“What are those pale-colored grapes over there?”

“Those are a variety of grape called muscats.”

Why are the muscats the only thing you left alone?

The man beside me looked at the shopkeeper and pointed to the red orange. “Interesting… What is that thing you’re holding in your hand?”

The shopkeeper threw his shoulders up with a start, then hid the orange behind himself.

“Now, this one’s not for sale. That other customer damaged it, you see.”

How rude.

“It’s not really damaged. It’s just lost its value as a product, isn’t that right?”

“You hush. Be quiet, little girl! I don’t have any fruit to sell you!”

“Oh really?”

I’ve been refused a sale.

Well, I wasn’t planning to buy anything anyway, so it’s not much of a problem for me.

“—Hey…”

As I was turning over the shopkeeper’s words, I heard a faint voice from beside me.

When I looked over, I saw that a man had been watching the exchange between the fuming-mad shopkeeper and the casually dismissive witch, wearing a dumbfounded expression. It was an expression that was full of surprise, as if he was looking at something he just couldn’t believe.

“…You… What’s up with your hair?”

“…What?”

“What’s with that hair, that color, how is it…?”

The man dropped the bags he had been holding in both hands.

The bags made a rustling sound and collapsed, and from them spilled all sorts of art supplies, paint and brushes of various sizes and colors and whatnot.

Then the man, quite excitedly, said, “Y-you! Please, if you don’t mind, won’t you come and model for my painting?! I’ll pay you handsomely!”

He took my hand.

“…What?”

I answered him with the same question again.

“How about five gold pieces?!”

The man who had shouted those words took me to a detached house in the middle of the city.

He was either very much the show-off or a real rich person, because the place he brought me to was obviously a luxurious mansion.

“This is quite a large house you have here.”

“Guess so. Despite appearances, I’m a pretty famous artist.”

“Could I ask your name?”

The man nodded as he placed his hand on the door to the front entrance.

“Coulomb.”

“…Ah. That guy.”

“Oh wow. Do you know my work?”

“Yeah. You’re the guy with the really unconventional use of color.”

“Mm…I’m blushing.”

Come to think of it, unconventional and weird are kind of synonyms, huh?

“Why do you make use of colors in that way?”

“Well, it’s because to me, that’s how the world looks.”

“Huh, does it really?”

“You don’t seem very interested…”

“I thought for sure those paintings had been made by someone really strange.”

“Strange guys aren’t the only people who are able to paint strange paintings, you know.”

“I guess you’re right. Though it’s also true that people who paint strange paintings don’t necessarily recognize that they are strange people.”

“Ha-ha…that’s pretty harsh.”

He narrowed his eyes and let out a dry chuckle.

Then the door opened.

I was shown farther inside the house and invited into his atelier.

In the ridiculously spacious room, the fresh scent of flowers hung in the air, mixed with the smell of paint. The curtains by the window flapped in the wind, swaying as they twinkled in the afternoon light.

There was a large workbench sitting right up against the wall, with paints and bottles and things, the use of which I didn’t really understand, scattered all over it.

He pulled a canvas out from a corner of the room, set it on an easel, and sat down. As he got ready to paint, he certainly did seem like a popular, famous artist. But the many failed paintings scattered around in the background gave rise to a strange sort of melancholy.

Not everything he paints is a success, the discarded paintings seemed to be saying.

“Well then, where should we begin…? Ah, for now, would you stand over by the window?”

“Sure.”

I did as I was told and stood where he indicated. By the way, I stood bolt upright.

“…Um, that’s pretty unnatural, so if you could strike some sort of pose, I’d be grateful.”

“Huh…”

Even though he was requesting a pose, I couldn’t come up with anything very good, so I tried raising both arms in the air.

“No good. It’s too unnatural. Please do something more natural looking.”

“Like this?” I covered both my ears.

“No. Something different.”

“What if I do this?” I covered both my eyes.

“That’s even worse. Next.”

“What do you think of this?” This time, I covered my mouth.

“Mm, let’s move away from covering things, shall we?”

“I see.” I was getting tired of this, and I took a seat on the window sill.

“That’s great!”

“Oh?”

So you’re finally satisfied with this pose? Interesting.

“All right, stay like that. Don’t move for a while. I’m starting to sketch now.” Then he took out a battered pencil and began staring intensely back and forth between the canvas and me.

“How long do I need to stay still?”

“Until I’m done drawing you.”

“So how long will that be?”

“Sorry, but I’m drawing now. I can’t concentrate when you’re talking, so please be quiet.”

“……”

What is this guy’s deal…?

After that, I don’t remember how much time passed. It could have been one hour, it could have been three; possibly even more time than that went by.

The time I spent just sitting on the windowsill and gazing outside was duller and more punishing than I’d imagined.

“—Okay. Let’s take a little break.”

Coulomb’s words as he sat down his brush and gently stretched sounded to me like a death sentence.

“…Huh? We’re coming back to it?”

In response to my question, he nodded, as if the answer was obvious.

“It’s only about halfway done yet. You must be tired, too. Have a seat somewhere over there. I’ll go get something to drink,” he said, and he left the room.

……

I was terribly exhausted, but more importantly, I was curious about how his painting was coming along. I walked over to the spot he had been glued to just a moment earlier and peered at the canvas.

“…Whoa.”

On it was a witch lingering by the window, gazing off somewhere in the distance with a sorrowful expression on her face. It wasn’t finished, but it was beautiful.

Who on earth could this model be?

This silly joke rose up in my mind, so I stepped away from the canvas and roamed around the atelier.

The failed paintings that were piled up on the floor. The window where I had been sitting. Various items the use of which I did not understand. Those, and the paints scattered across the desktop.

It was all rather charming.

It was as if all the agonizing days of an artist who people called a genius were packed into this one room.

“……?”

As I was looking aimlessly around the room, suddenly, my eyes fell on a glass that was standing alone on top of the desk. Without thinking, I picked it up. The thick, viscous, bloodlike liquid inside it sloshed around, and a single drop spilled over the edge and ran onto my hand.

I sniffed it, thinking it might be a drink, but it had a scent that was obviously not palatable. In fact, it stank like paint.

What on earth could this be?

“Hmm…”

There was no way the answer would come to someone like me who knew so little about painting, no matter how much I puzzled over it.

“Maybe it’s a bad batch of paint?” I pondered.

Coulomb came back into the room just as I set the glass down on the desk and started to wipe my hand.

“Okay, sorry for keeping you—Wait, hey. Hey, are you okay?”

He came back carrying two cups, and as soon as he saw me, his eyes went wide.

“…? What do you mean?”

“What do you mean, what do I mean—?” He was starting to panic a little, and without even closing the door, he set the cups down where he was and started trotting around the room. “You’re bleeding, aren’t you? Okay, right. There ought to be something we can use to stop the bleeding over here—”

“……?”

Bleeding?

“Did you happen to touch a blade or something? I’m so sorry. This room is a total mess…” He pulled some strips of cloth out from a corner of the room and handed them to me. “Here, please use these to stop the bleeding. Although it looks like the wound is a shallow one… Doesn’t it hurt?”

I took the cloth.

“Um, I’m really not bleeding at all,” I said as I wiped away the liquid that was on my hand. Then I said to the stunned Coulomb, “I’m sorry. I was curious about the glass that was on your desk, and I touched it. Looks like some of the liquid that was inside it got on my hand.”

“……” For just one short moment, his face twisted. “A-ah. Was that it…? Looks like I jumped to the wrong conclusion.”

“Yes—sorry. I shouldn’t have touched it.”

“No. That’s fine. The most important thing is that you’re not hurt.”

“…Yeah.”

When I finished wiping my hand, the liquid soaked into the cloth somewhat. There was no mark left on my hand. It seemed to have wiped away cleanly.

I asked, “By the way, why did you think I had gotten hurt?”

“Uh, um, well…I wonder why… I guess because it looked like blood?”

“That stuff?”

As I pointed at the desk, I asked again.

“You mistook that for blood?”

The stuff I was pointing at—the liquid on the desk that was viscous like blood, the pitch-black liquid, was swaying slightly inside the glass.

“…Sigh…”

After letting out a deep sigh, the man sat in front of the easel that was holding his half-finished painting. He looked vexed.

Perhaps he had realized there was no way to continue to keep his secret hidden.

“Please don’t tell a soul what I’m about to say, okay?”

“Sure, I won’t.”

Though it’s not like I have anyone to tell in the first place.

Then he told me—

“I…can’t see colors. Ever since I was born, the things people call colors haven’t been visible to my eyes. The sky, the sea, the forest—everything I see is black and white and shades of gray. But I thought that was normal. I first began to suspect something when I was a child. My friends were distinguishing things that looked the same to me, calling them ‘red’ or ‘blue.’ It made me wonder what on earth they were talking about.”

“…Hmm.”

“I’ve never been able to see color myself. I can’t see what others see. It came as a serious shock when I realized that fact. Though at this point, that’s all in the past.”

He lowered his eyes to stare at the floor.

Then, after a long pause, he continued, “Even though I couldn’t see colors, I never confessed as much to the people around me. I pretended to be normal. I acted as if I could see things I couldn’t see.”

“……”

Maybe that’s why he’s such a show-off.

“Well, even if you can’t see colors, you can still live a normal life if you try. The only time I had any trouble was when I was painting—painting pictures has been my hobby since I was small, you see, and even after I knew I couldn’t see color, I never wanted to stop. So I kept on painting, purely as a hobby. I didn’t have the slightest intention of seeking any recognition…”

“And now you’re highly acclaimed, huh?”

“That’s right. The funny thing is my paintings were praised anyway. The people of this country who saw my paintings made a big fuss, calling them unique and saying, ‘What an unconventional use of color!’ and so on.”

I wonder whether this is another effect of living in a country full of vain show-offs or whether they really think he’s a genius—

“So to make a long story short, you mixed up random colors and painted with them, and before you knew what was happening, you’d become a famous artist. Is that it?”

“Well, I guess that’s about how it went, yeah… And so, because of that, I’m struggling now.”

“Oh…? Why’s that? There’s no sweeter deal than making lots of money just by painting things the way you see them, is there?”

“You make it sound so simple, but it’s not so easy coming up with these crazy color schemes, you know. The more famous I get, and the more works I produce, the more criticism I face. They say my color balance is off, or that my paintings are starting to look like realistic landscapes, and all sorts of other stuff.”

“…Hmm.”

“That’s why, recently, I’ve been thinking I should try something new—I’m planning to paint something in only black and white, using that stuff you were holding earlier.”

“That stuff…?” I looked toward the desk. “You mean the liquid in that glass?”

“It’s charcoal ink. By diluting it with water, I’ll be able to paint the world exactly as I see it.”

“…Ah.”

“I want to try making a new kind of painting using that ink. What do you think?”

Don’t ask me…

“What if you paint two and then decide? Two different types, one painting done the same way you have been doing it until now, and one where you use the new charcoal ink or whatever you called it.”

“Foolishness. Even if I painted two of the same picture, I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference, would I?”

“……”

Oh, right.

“Now, no matter what anybody says, I intend to paint with the ink this time.”

“……”

If you had already made up your mind to try painting a picture with the charcoal ink, then why did you ask for my opinion? I don’t understand it. Am I just here to be your sounding board?

“I feel like once this painting is complete and put on display, people will see my true abilities for the first time. They’ll be able to tell whether I actually have any talent or whether I’m some pitiful guy who simply got lucky and was just elevated by chance—”

In other words, this painting is his way of testing that out.

He must be struggling with the idea of getting real criticism around here. This country is full of nothing but vain show-offs and shams.

That must be all the more reason why he’s decided to paint the world exactly as it looks to his eyes.

“Well, that’s enough of a break, I think,” he said. It sounded like he was indirectly telling me to hurry up and get back to my position.

I did as I was commanded and walked over to the window.

Coulomb stared earnestly at the painting of me on his canvas as he rearranged his brushes.

Then he looked up as if he had remembered something and asked, “Ah—come to think of it, what is your true hair color?”

I answered his question as I took my seat by the window.

“Even you can see that.”

[Publication Information] Kakuyomu Post Story

[Author Comments]

I wrote this story for Volume 2, but the content was too gray, in several senses, and it was rejected. Initially, I complained about it and vowed that I would have it published, and because of my persistence, it later wound up being published in Kakuyomu. I really like this kind of story, so I’d like to write these more frequently, but…