Kumi-Kumi
Just how much time had passed? Even if they were to go back, the way they’d come was blocked with moss. When you stuck your hands into the moss to try to part it, sap shot out, and when Lillian got it on her face, she couldn’t open her eyes for a while. By the time she somehow opened them, the right half of her face had turned green, and after that, she spoke less, and Kumi-Kumi also stopped talking, but to follow the principal’s orders, there was nothing for it but to keep going forward, and the two of them just silently moved through the ruins.
It was a single path, going straight down a gentle slope. There was no room to stray, with the floor, ceiling, and walls all green. But she didn’t feel like she was going the right way. No matter how many steps she took, she never got used to the sensation of her feet sinking in the moss. She felt like she was going to get dragged straight in. Kumi-Kumi imagined that the moss was completely bottomless inside. You would sink forever and ever.
Walking wasn’t a struggle. She was scared of being unable to move—because then she wouldn’t be able to fulfill the principal’s orders.
Kumi-Kumi put a hand to her mouth. She couldn’t understand why this scared her so much.
Strange—until just a moment ago, she hadn’t questioned this fear at all. And now she didn’t understand why she had never questioned it. It was beyond bizarre. If anyone was in the position of giving Kumi-Kumi orders, it was the Caspar Faction higher-ups. That big shot who’d been visiting her had the right to give her orders, and ever since the attack on the school, she had been following orders to a T.
Given Kumi-Kumi’s current position, wasn’t the principal actually her enemy? Kumi-Kumi hadn’t been at all enthusiastic about the assault on the school. She’d had no intention of helping the aggressors and attacking her classmates. But she thought she wouldn’t have wanted to obey the principal, either. Why did she so blithely have to follow her orders and listen to what she was told?
What’s more, she didn’t understand what this place was. The path was very complex, covered in moss and hard to navigate. Just walking wore her down. She felt like she’d been told that this was a really dangerous place. Wouldn’t going any farther be equivalent to walking to their deaths? The brownish-green moss looked commonplace, like it could be in a graveyard or behind the school, but she couldn’t help but feel it was mysterious and frightening.
And then she remembered, Oh yeah. She thought they’d tied lifelines around themselves. If they were to pull them, they could communicate that they were in trouble. Setting aside for now how none of this made sense, she figured they should just get help, and so she pulled the yarn, but there was no resistance at all, and the broken end came back to her.
Kumi-Kumi groaned. Lillian’s yarn was magical. It shouldn’t be cut so easily, so why had it been torn off like nothing?
“…Lilli…an.”
She addressed the magical girl going ahead of her, but there was no response. Lillian was just pushing forward.
“Lillian.”
She called out firmly and grabbed her shoulder. But Lillian still didn’t stop, and Kumi-Kumi put both hands on her shoulders and turned her toward her.
She gasped. Lillian had an eternal smile like a Bodhisattva statue, her face all covered with moss. Her mouth and nose were plugged, and she shouldn’t be able to breathe, but she didn’t seem like she was suffering at all.
Kumi-Kumi automatically thrust Lillian away, and Lillian staggered, hit her head on the wall, and then began sinking down into the moss without any resistance at all. Kumi-Kumi panicked, took Lillian’s hand, and tried to pull her back, but she felt too weak. She still tried to pull her anyway, but her legs slipped, and she hit the wall together with Lillian and sank on in.
She couldn’t even yell about how stupid this was. Her whole field of vision was green. Kumi-Kumi put a hand in her pocket and clasped a tiny fragment. It had already been broken beyond recognition, but it was a remnant of the dragon object that they had planned to decorate the classroom with.
She clasped it tightly, so tightly, hard enough that it hurt. Surely, it was hopeless now, but in spite of that, she remembered the time when she had made the decoration, the time she’d spent preparing it with everyone, and clasped it tight.