They left the Ark and headed for the nearby ruins.
According to Haru, they had once been a walled city called Alterna that had been home to many people. But that had apparently been over a hundred years ago.
As he had guessed based on what he could see while they’d been approaching the walls, two thirds of the former Alterna was forest, and the other third was bushes. The stonework walls were still intact, but most of the buildings had collapsed and been swallowed up by the trees.
Narrow paths had been beaten through the forest and bushes, which Haru was using to advance into the old city. The footprints that Manato could make out on the ground told him that these paths had been formed by the passage of humans. Or more likely, the same human coming and going over and over. If so, he had no doubt it had been Haru.
“This place is relatively safe. The only dangerous creatures that live here are some peppies—they’re, like, these rabbit-dog sort of things. And the occasional pit rat, I guess.”
“Can you eat either of them?”
“Pit rats taste awful. Peppy meat is good, but they’re quick to run away.”
“How big are these peppies?”
“About this big, maybe?” Haru turned around and held his hands out in front of him, spread apart at a distance a little less than the width of his shoulders.
“There are far fewer large beasts than there used to be. The Tenryu Mountains south of here have a bunch, but that’s dragon territory, so you generally don’t want to go there.”
“Why are there fewer large beasts?”
“Overhunting.”
“You mean someone killed too many of them? Was it you, Haru?”
“As if. No, it wasn’t me. It was the servants of the gods.”
“Gods? Ohhh. I think I’ve heard of those. The yakuza worship them. They’re important people. Well, actually, I guess they might not be people, huh? There was this great bear in Kariza called Three-Eyes. Or...I think there was? Never saw him myself. He was this huge bear with black and white spots, and he once came into town and devoured like thirty people, they say.”
“Sounds dangerous.”
“They built a statue in Kariza. Of Three-Eyes, I mean. Everyone was terrified, and the yakuza built a shrine to him, and they prayed at it. Is that what gods are like?”
“They might be somewhat similar.”
“We hunted all over the mountains around Kariza, but we never ran into any Three-Eyes. I wonder if that story was even true.”
“I don’t know anything about your Three-Eyes, but the gods do exist. The God of Light, Lumiaris, and the God of Dark, Skullhell.”
“Lumiaris...and Skullhell? So there’s two of these people?”
“Gods aren’t people, but yeah, there are two of them.”
Eventually, Haru and Manato came to an open area. It had obviously been cleared—not only were there no bushes, there wasn’t even any long grass. The ground had been leveled, and orderly rows of plants were sticking out of the ground.
“Huh? Is that a hut?”
Manato pointed at the edge of the clearing. There was indeed a hut over there that looked like someone had taken a tent and enlarged it.
“I built that. I grow fruits and root and leafy vegetables here. It’s my garden.”
“Don’t the animals eat them?”
“As long as they don’t eat everything, it’s never been an issue, since I’ve been the only one here.”
“But you aren’t alone anymore, huh?”
“No... I guess not.”
Haru walked around the edge of the garden to reach the hut and Manato followed behind him, being careful not to step on the plants.
There was a wooden table and chair next to the hut. A number of barrels and pots were scattered around nearby, and some picks and shovels for digging in the earth were leaning against the side of the hut, along with a few other tools.
Haru gestured for Manato to sit in the chair, then sat on the table himself. Manato took the offered seat.
The bugs and birds were constantly chirping, but it was still quiet despite that. Was it because they were inside the defensive walls? This place was pretty different from the forests in Japan.
“Have you always been alone, Haru?”
“It’s been quite some time since I’ve met another person. The last time anyone came to Grimgar from Japan was...forty-eight years ago, I think?”
“And you haven’t seen anyone since then?”
“I was in touch with them for a number of years after that.”
“Huh. I take it that since you said ‘them,’ there was more than one person?”
“There were two people.”
“Where are they?”
Haru shook his head in response to Manato’s question. “Grimgar is being fought over by two factions: the divine soldiers who’ve devoted themselves to Lumiaris and the thralls who’ve submitted to Skullhell. There are other groups too—or there should be, but...I haven’t been in touch with any of them for a long, long time.”
“Are these divine soldiers and thralls...human?”
“Some of them were.”
“But they aren’t anymore?”
“There are nonhuman races in Grimgar.”
“Races?”
“They’re about as smart as humans, and some of them look a lot like us, while others look pretty different. There’s the elves and dwarves. The hornedfolk. The piratsians. The centaurs. The goblins. The kobolds. You should think of them as being just like humans, except they happen to come in a wide variety of different forms. Those are the different races. Humans like you are simply one variety among many.”
“And you call all of them people?”
“Yeah, I guess I would.”
“And if people...devote themselves, or submit, to the gods...then they’re no longer people, is that it?”
“Yeah. As far as my own experience with them goes, I haven’t seen anything to make me believe that either the divine soldiers or the thralls are fit to be called people. They’re something else.”
“Does something about them change? Like the way they look?”
“Uh, yeah...” Haru let out a sigh and hung his head. “If it was just their appearance, that wouldn’t have been so bad... But what’s inside of them changes too. Everything changed. Grimgar changed...”
He seems pretty down about it.
“Hmm?” Manato cocked his head to the side. Was he imagining it? The way Haru was talking was making him wonder if Haru himself had been the one to change them somehow.
But at that moment, there was the sound of beating wings and rustling leaves. Birds. An incredible number of birds took off flying all at once.
Whatever was happening, it didn’t stop there. First, the birds flew in the opposite direction of the Tenryu Mountains. Then, as if in response, more birds started fleeing in other directions. No, there was no “as if” about it—the other birds had flown away in response to the first group doing so. When birds sitting in a tree detected something unusual, they would take off, and then more birds would follow suit. It was a common occurrence in the forest.
“Haru,” Manato said, rising from the chair.
“Yeah,” Haru responded, getting off the table. “I let my guard down. I assumed they wouldn’t come near here.”
“Who are they?”
“There are thralls of Skullhell living about four kilometers northwest of Alterna. It’s probably a group of them. We’re getting out of here.”
“What about your garden? Will it be okay?”
“Don’t worry about it. If I need to make another, then that’s what—”
Haru stopped mid-sentence and reached inside his cloak, pulling out a dagger that he held with a backhand grip. Manato grabbed his bow and started to pull an arrow from his quiver, but Haru stopped him.
“Arrows won’t work on them... I’m such an idiot these days. It’s more than just my skills having dulled. I truly didn’t notice at all.”
What hadn’t Haru noticed? Manato already had a pretty good idea.
The two of them were looking in the direction opposite from where the first birds had taken off. But whatever was coming wasn’t coming from there; it was coming out of the forest a little to the left of where they were facing. Someone had rushed out into the garden.
“I was wrong,” Haru muttered. “It’s...not a thrall? A divine soldier—”
They had been people, but were no longer fit to be called that. Haru had said their appearance and what was inside of them had changed. And it was true. The thing that had appeared before them was bizarre.
It had a head, and arms and legs were sticking out of its torso. It was shaped like a human. But there was glistening, shiny stuff covering its whole body that looked like polished metal, but was too smooth to actually be that. And then there were its eyes. It had two of them, but they were shining brightly.
It was holding something long in its hands. A spear, probably, with a banner attached to it. The design on the banner wasn’t a square or a triangle. It wasn’t even a circle. Manato didn’t know what to call it, but it was a shape with six points.
“A priest, huh? In that case... Come on, Manato.”
Haru took off running. Before Manato could finish thinking that he should probably do as Haru said, his body was already chasing after the masked man.
Haru headed into the forest in the direction of the Tenryus. Something was over there too. Eyes. Shining eyes turned toward them. But with this one, only the head was changed. That stuff that shined like metal only covered this one’s head. It was different from the one that had the spear with the banner. It was wearing clothes too. A baggy outfit made of white cloth was wrapped around its body. It was holding something like a stick. But it wasn’t just any stick. There was a ball-shaped thing stuck to the end of it. Getting hit with that would hurt pretty bad.
“Haru?!”
“It’s a divine soldier captain.”
Right after saying that, Haru, who had been running ahead of Manato, vanished from his field of view. Manato was surprised, but he managed to figure out that Haru had lowered his stance, then circled around a tree that was ahead of them on the right. The guy was moving like a wild cat. Manato had never met one of the elusive great cats of the mountains. If he had, it would probably have eaten him. He had only seen a mid-sized wild cat before, but it had been ridiculously quick. It had sprinted between the trees, and then the next thing Manato had known, it had been up in the branches, looking down at him. Even the fastest people couldn’t have hoped to imitate it. Or so he’d thought back then, but apparently he’d been wrong. Haru was like a wild cat.
Before he knew it, Haru had closed in on that thing with the shiny stuff just on its head and two shining eyes—a divine soldier captain, was it? Haru wasn’t in front of the divine soldier captain. He wasn’t beside it either.
He’s behind it.
Haru had moved around behind the divine soldier.
“Wow!” Manato shouted, eyes wide with surprise. He came to a stop without even meaning to.