It had already been quite a long time since I’d encountered that girl in the deep forest and had that conversation with her.
But no matter how much time passed, I had never forgotten about her.
Even now, I vividly remember that night when I first met her.
How strange. I wonder why?
Perhaps it’s because every time there’s a beautiful night with a full moon hanging in the sky, I recall the dream she told me about. Or maybe it’s because every time I gaze up at the sky while traveling, I start hoping I might somehow, someday, find the blue bird called a goddess.
“Ah, if it isn’t Elaina. Good to see you again.”
“Oh, hi there.”
Or maybe it’s because I run into her with some regularity at my travel destinations.
……
Maybe it’s because she and I are traveling around the same area.
The first time we met was several years ago, but ever since then, every few months, we run into each other on the road.
The second time we met was, if I’m remembering correctly, about one week after the day when I presented her with that fish. We casually reunited with the simple greeting that I recorded above.
Given that we were seeing each other again after a week, we chatted with some excitement at the time.
I asked her, “So did you find your goddess or whatever it was?”
But she laughed it off. “There’s no way I would find one in just one week, is there?” Then she sighed.
After exchanging some conversation basically along those lines, we parted there, both of us feeling like it was pretty unlikely that we were going to run into each other again, but at the same time thinking that we didn’t have that much to talk about, since it was the last time we would ever see each other. When we parted, I waved and offered an uncharacteristically generic, empty good-bye: “If we run into each other again, let’s go out to eat together or something.”
The next time I saw her was about two months after that, I suppose.
“Wow, Elaina! Long time no see! You’re alone?”
“Oh, hi there, Ashley.”
In a popular restaurant in a certain country, she appeared before me, waving her hand to and fro.
“That’s quite a rich way to use a table there.”
Apparently, the sight of a witch occupying a four-seater table in the middle of a crowded restaurant didn’t make a good impression.
“It got crowded after I came in,” I told her by way of explanation as I gestured to the seat across from me. “You could sit with me if you like?”
“Oh? You don’t mind? Thanks.”
I shook my head. “I was starting to feel ashamed, so you’re actually helping me out. I was just getting uncomfortable with all the looks I was getting, so this is perfect.”
And then, strangely enough, as if to make the suggestion I’d offered the last time we’d parted come true, we sat opposite each other and had dinner, exchanging friendly chatter as we ate. When I asked her if she had encountered a goddess, she laughed and said she still hadn’t found any trace of one. Her expression looked wearier than when I’d seen her previously.
After that, we went our separate ways. But when we parted that day, I waved and said, “See you next time,” and had sort of a hunch that I would run into her again.
And that hunch naturally proved to be true. I found her again about three months after that.
“You’re an adventurer, too? If you like, why don’t you join up with us?”
One evening, when I was roaming around searching for lodgings in a certain country—
—I spotted a group of suspicious men surrounding a single woman.
“Hey, c’mon, please? Let’s hunt up some loot together!” said one.
“Just one run is fine. Come on,” said another.
My, my, looks like a pickup attempt, I thought to myself. I deliberately walked right past them so that I could get a good look at the situation.
Immediately after I passed them, I backed up three steps and blinked in disbelief.
The young woman who was surrounded by the men, frowning in annoyance, was an acquaintance of mine.
It was Ashley, the adventurer hunting for goddesses.
“No…I, um… Well, you see…”
When I caught sight of her, she seemed to be in the middle of searching for an excuse to turn them down. But maybe she was bad with words, because her voice gradually got quieter and quieter as she shook her head at the men. “Really, I’m fine on my own, so…” Eventually, she was just mumbling.
The men put more and more pressure on her, and she seemed surprisingly timid.
“Don’t worry! No matter how we look, we’re really strong, you know? If you’re with us, you can depend on us!”
One of the men took her hand and started walking.
If you’re so strong, you wouldn’t really need to take her with you, now would you?
“Excuse me. That girl is traveling with me, so—”
As thanks for what she had done the last time we’d met, I grabbed hold of Ashley’s other hand from behind. I was fully aware that I was sticking my nose in where it didn’t belong, but—
“…! Elaina…!”
Naturally enough, I couldn’t just leave her there as she was being taken away by questionable men. With a tug, I pulled her from their grasp, and she hid herself behind me to get away from them and shouted, “What she said!” She was like a cat threatening them from the safety of her hiding place.
In response, the men gave us both extremely rude looks, as if they were sizing us up.
“Oh, what’s that? A pair of you? Then how about you come with us, too—?”
“Impossible.”
Then I immediately turned on my heel. I had stealthily readied my wand to shower spells down on them if they chased after us, but fortunately, they didn’t seem to be that stupid.
We left the crowd, and when we got to a quieter spot, I turned around.
Ashley looked uneasy. I found that funny and laughed in spite of myself.
“Doesn’t seem like you’re used to that sort of thing. That’s not what I would expect,” I said.
She hung her head awkwardly.
“I knew I had to turn them down, but… I also thought I might be able to get some information that would lead to a goddess from people like that, so I guess I felt like it would be wasteful or something to dismiss them… How can I put it…I wasn’t sure? Basically.”
“Any goddess you discover with guys like that isn’t worth finding.”
You’ve really got your back up against the wall here, don’t you?
I asked her, “Is meeting a goddess really such an important dream for you?”
“It certainly is. If it wasn’t, I wouldn’t be spending years as an adventurer, now would I?”
“……”
That was my fourth encounter with this woman, so I wasn’t necessarily all that familiar with her circumstances.
She was an adventurer who had left her hometown to chase after birds. That was about all I knew about her.
And so I asked, “If you don’t mind, do you think I could hear more about why you’re chasing the goddesses?”
“…It’s a long story. Is that all right?”
“That doesn’t bother me.”
It would be pretty anticlimactic if the story of a dream you’ve been chasing for years wrapped up quickly.
“Then how about we go eat together at the restaurant over there? My treat, as thanks for saving me.”
As she spoke, she took my hand and walked off.
My oh my, that’s all I could ever ask for!
“Looking forward to it.”
I nodded and looked up at the night sky.
Just like the night we had first met, there were clouds floating past a full moon.