CHAPTER SEVEN Immediately, Morisaki noticed that something was wrong. The monsters weren’t attacking him. No— More accurately, it was as if they didn’t even see him. They all went after Asuna. What’s going on? What’s different between Asuna and me? Is it because she has the clavis fragment? Morisaki thought, but thinking wouldn’t get them out of the situation they were in. Anyway, right now, I need to— He was about to use the gun again, but then he remembered it hadn’t had any effect. Dammit— Wasn’t there anything about these things in the Arch Angels’ research? Think! The Arch Angels had known of the existence of Agartha, but no humans had been there since the invention of photography—at least, none who had then returned. The Quetzal Coatls were on the surface, so data could be gleaned from them, but the organization didn’t know much about creatures in the interior. All gray with red, shining eyes and sharp claws…which means… There was only one thing he could think of. Are they Izoku? One force of nature in this world was the tribe that did not want the Topside and Agartha to mingle. He was pretty sure Izoku was what they were called. Their weaknesses were water and light. But— Why would they go after Asuna? Wondering about the question was pointless. Water was precious, but he did have some in his canteen for drinking. He didn’t know how effective it would be, but it might serve as a weapon. However— Damn! Where did Asuna go? Before anything else, he had to get moving. Morisaki broke into a run. Find the Izoku. Asuna will be nearby. In the darkness, he retraced the path he’d just taken. He went through the ruin, climbed down the rocky area and onto the plain— No, there was a riverbed there. A stark reminder that humans didn’t have a very reliable sense of direction. That didn’t matter now, though. The Izoku come first. Look for red lights. He looked around, and— There! Morisaki reached for his gun out of habit but then remembered that it was the wrong move. The canteen was his weapon. It didn’t feel like much of a weapon, mind you, but he’d just have to believe in it. He started toward the Izoku—but then he heard a voice and knew that something was very, very wrong. “Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!” It was the cry of a young child, probably no more than five. What’s that? Then he saw her, a lone girl crouching in the middle of the river. Morisaki didn’t know whether she’d gone there on purpose, but that had probably saved her. When you were up against Izoku, rivers meant safety. But— What’s a kid doing in a place like this? He had to go save Asuna…but he couldn’t just abandon this one, either. Clicking his tongue softly in irritation, Morisaki ran to the little girl. Before she was aware of it, Asuna had reached a ruin. Not that it mattered—she felt almost dizzy with despair. The corridor was a dead end. Desperately, she searched for a way forward, but there didn’t seem to be one, and the monsters were slowly closing in. It’s all over, Asuna thought. She was ready to die. Just as a monster reached out to grab her— “Asunaaaa!” A shadow that had fallen out of the sky sliced off the monster’s hand with its short sword. “We’re making a break for it! Run!” Shin cut into the crowd of monsters in the corridor, opening a path. Asuna still wasn’t sure what exactly had happened, but she followed him. “You’re…Shin?” Asuna said. Shin grinned, looking rather proud of himself. “You got it right that time.” After beating the monsters back for the moment, they ran down some stairs. “This is an Izoku nest,” he explained. “Izoku?” “They say your blood’s been defiled, and they want to devour you. Come on!” “How did you know I was here? After you left, I followed you to Agartha…” “Yeah, which is why we’ve got so much trouble now!” “What’s your problem?! I wanted to see you again—” “Enough talking, just run! They’re coming!” “I am running!” Even as Asuna shouted back at him, she mustered up her strength and kept going. “Shin, they’re gaining on us!” “I know! They’re weak against light and water. If we’re lucky, we’ll make it to a river or something.” And then— “Dammit!” —they ran out of land. They were on the edge of a sheer cliff. Once again, Asuna thought, It’s all over. “Asuna,” Shin said, but she didn’t even respond. …For a moment anyway. “You have a clavis fragment, right?” “—Yeah.” When she nodded, Shin smiled. “If we get out of this, you have to give it to me.” No sooner had he spoken than— As Shun had once done, Shin pulled Asuna into his arms and jumped. “Aaaaaaah!” Far below, there was a river, and the two of them fell down, narrowly slipping between the boulders. A tall column of water splashed up. “Asuna! Hey, Asuna!” Someone was calling to her. Her whole body felt heavy, and she didn’t want to wake up. But the voice just wouldn’t stop. “Asuna!” Finally, she opened her eyes… …and saw Morisaki’s face. He looked terribly worried. “…Mr. Morisaki?” “Pull yourself together!” Morisaki helped her sit up. Asuna finally realized that she was on the bank of a river, the sun was already up, and she was dripping wet. “If this little one hadn’t been here, you might not have gotten off so easy… You’d better thank her.” “Little one?” Morisaki glanced to the side at Mimi, who was watching her steadily. “She led me to you.” “…Who is that girl?” Asuna had noticed the child Morisaki was carrying on his back. “Those monsters were chasing her, too. It’s a long story, but I ended up saving her.” Possibly in an attempt to camouflage his embarrassment, Morisaki pushed his glasses up with his middle finger. “Okay, let’s start a fire over there. Come warm up.” When she was sitting by the campfire, holding a coffee cup filled to the brim with hot water, Asuna’s mind finally began to clear, and she recounted the events of the previous evening. “So then he told you to hand over the clavis?” Morisaki asked. He put a hand to his mouth, thinking hard. “And then there’s the creatures that attacked you and this kid. We don’t seem to be welcome here.” He glanced at the little girl, who’d completely recovered her energy and was busy playing with Mimi. “All right, what do we do with her?” The girl seemed to realize they were talking about her and ran up to Morisaki. She didn’t seem capable of proper speech, but she said, “Dah, dah” and pointed into the distance. “Downriver, huh?” Morisaki said. Then it happened. “Ghk… Ngh…” At the sound of a small, muffled groan, Asuna finally realized that Shin was lying in the shadow of the boulder. A deep gash ran from his shoulder to his chest. She almost averted her eyes—but now wasn’t the time. “Shin!” She ran to him. It was an awful wound. “…I nearly forgot about him.” As Morisaki walked over, Shin sprang up, his face twisting with pain. “—! You’re—!” He closed the distance between himself and Morisaki in a rush. “Arch Angel!” Stopping about three paces from Morisaki, Shin held his short sword at the ready. Asuna was worried about Shin’s injury, and she wanted to keep him and Morisaki from fighting; but she didn’t know what she should say—so she didn’t say anything at all. The hostility in Shin’s voice was apparent. “I know you have a clavis! Leave it here and get out of Agartha!” “Why?” Morisaki asked quietly. Shin shook his head. “How should I know why?! My job is to make it happen!” he shouted back, then took the remaining three steps. “Hand over the clavis!” But he was in bad shape, and so was his swordsmanship. Morisaki evaded the short sword easily, then struck Shin in the back of the neck with his gun. Shin collapsed without a struggle. “Shin!” Running to the boy, Asuna glared at Morisaki. For his part, Morisaki seemed unbothered. “She pointed that way; we should try that direction. There might be a village.” Asuna had one request that she had to insist on, no matter what. “We’re taking him with us.” “…If you want.” Morisaki took bandages and antiseptic out of his bag and tossed them to Asuna. Asuna disinfected Shin’s wound, then bound it firmly. Come to think of it, I bandaged Shun’s arm, too, with my scarf, she thought. Shin’s horse proved to be useful. It seemed particularly loyal to its owner; Morisaki told her it had been beside Shin when he’d found him unconscious. Asuna had known that horses were intelligent animals, but she hadn’t thought they were that intelligent. They put the girl and Shin, who was still out cold, on the horse’s back and headed downriver. Morisaki and Asuna traveled on foot. After an exhausting several hours of walking, they saw below them a village surrounded by a river and a wall. This was nothing like the ruins they’d been seeing ever since arriving in Agartha. Smoke from fires, maybe for cooking or maybe for heat, rose from the clusters of wooden houses, and enormous windmills seemed to be harnessing the wind for some practical purpose. Farm fields spread right up to the outer wall, giving them a clear sense of the villagers who lived there. “There are people here…,” Asuna murmured. Morisaki nodded. “It’s our first living village. Let’s tread carefully.” As the two of them and the horse they led drew closer, some of the locals who’d been working in the fields noticed them and hastily retreated into the village. From the urgency in the villagers’ behavior, Asuna and Morisaki guessed that they might be about to encounter some resistance. And they were completely right. Almost immediately, three sturdy men on horseback came galloping toward them from the village. Their matching white cloaks indicated that they belonged to some sort of vigilance committee. Either that or they were important members of the village. As the men approached, the others yielded the way to them. “Everyone back!” Obeying the men, the villagers withdrew behind the wall. Asuna and Morisaki walked straight toward the riders. The small girl jumped down from the horse and ran happily toward the group. When they saw her, the men murmured to one another, but Asuna couldn’t hear what they were saying. Meanwhile… “Halt!” one of the men barked, and she and Morisaki stopped in their tracks. The man slowly came up to them, acting as a representative of his group. Morisaki took a step forward, shielding Asuna and the horse. “You have our thanks for returning a child of the village,” the man said in a dignified voice. “However, you are Topsiders. The village of Amaurot cannot accept you. We must ask you to leave.” Morisaki didn’t seem to know what to say, so Asuna mustered her courage. If nothing else, they had to do something about Shin. Pointing at Shin, who was lying across the horse’s back, she said, “Could you look at this boy, at least?! He’s injured, and he has a fever.” At that, she heard the men whisper among themselves: “…He’s from the village of Canaan.” “Why is a native of Agartha with Topsiders?” Then the spokesman drew his sword and shouted. “We must not! Begone!” No, please, wait! Asuna almost said it aloud, but Morisaki shook his head and turned to go. “Wait,” said a solitary old man with white hair and long whiskers. Gently, he scooped the little girl into his arms. “Manna, I’m glad you came back.” Then he stood beside the men and spoke to Asuna and Morisaki. “Please forgive the village for its discourtesy… Will you not let me thank the ones who’ve saved my granddaughter?” “But—!” the man shouted, but the elder remained calm. “Just for a night. Allow me to salvage my honor.” “……” Grudgingly, the man returned his sword to its scabbard. Then the group simply left. “This way. You’ll draw too much attention cutting through the village.” And so Asuna’s party was shown to the elder’s house. When they arrived at the spacious dwelling, the first thing the old man did was treat Shin’s wound. He had a variety of what appeared to be the raw materials for medicine at home; he ground them into paste and mixed them together into a liquid, which he meticulously painted onto Shin’s wound. “His fever should come down soon. It will probably be a while before he can move, but he won’t die. Don’t worry too much.” Shin’s chest was still heaving with pain, but Asuna sighed with relief. “Oh, I’m glad… Thank you, sir,” she said, and she meant it. If it hadn’t been for this man, they wouldn’t even have been allowed into the village. Plus, he’d carefully tended to Shin’s wound. There was no way to thank him enough. “That’s an Izoku wound, isn’t it?” “…I think so.” “They are a cursed race that abhors light and water, but they are also one of the mechanisms that seek to keep the world as it is. That is why they hate admixtures.” “Admixtures…,” said Morisaki. “Then that girl is…” The old man nodded. “Manna’s father is a Topsider. It’s rare, but it does happen.” “…It was a test?” Morisaki was gazing at the elder, his eyes sharp. The old man nodded again slowly. “Not one I wished for, of course.” “? What do you mean?” Asuna couldn’t process the situation. By rights, she was a rather quick thinker, but Morisaki’s realization was backed up by both personal and indirect experience. He also benefited from keen insight. He pushed up his glasses with his index finger. “Yesterday, when I found that girl, she was inside a ruin of sorts. Think about it. How many hours did we walk to get here? No child would wander in there on her own.” That was all he needed to say for Asuna to understand. Her heart felt heavier. “Then…,” she murmured, and Morisaki nodded. “Right. They intentionally put her somewhere the Izoku would appear, to see if she’d come home safely. They wanted to test whether the world would allow her to exist.” The old man didn’t nod, and he didn’t deny it. He only said, “Come with me” and left the room. The man’s wooden house was extremely rambling. It was decorated here and there with striking woven cloths and other objects from traditional Agarthan culture. “For us, a visit from Topsiders isn’t a good omen.” As he walked ahead of Morisaki and Asuna, the elder kept speaking. “Long ago, the emperors and kings of the surface spent several centuries plundering wealth and techniques from Agartha. They needed our knowledge and riches to control the surface, and in exchange, they brought wars upon wars. Our cities were more magnificent than any on the surface, but all were destroyed. Our numbers dwindled, and now only a few villages remain. That was why we used the claves to close the doors, locking them so that Topsiders couldn’t enter.” The man gave Morisaki a thoughtful look. “Let me show you my library.” Then he glanced at Asuna. “Young lady, would you help with the dinner preparations, over there?” “…Yes.” To be honest, she’d wanted to listen to more of the old man’s account, but it probably wouldn’t be a pleasant tale for her to hear. Maybe it would be better to distract herself with cooking after all. With that in mind, she entered the room the man had indicated. Manna was already there, stringing beans. Mimi was there beside her, although there was no telling when she’d reached the house. She jumped up onto Asuna’s shoulder. “Daah!” Manna ran up to Asuna, caught her hand, and pulled her over toward the table. Overall, the dishes there were not unlike the food at home. To start, she filled the pot sticker wrappers (or a close approximation) with a mixture of minced meat and vegetables. Next, she was asked to cut up an ohne, a vegetable that looked a lot like a daikon radish. Both were tasks Asuna was very used to. “Hey, Mimi, don’t.” As Asuna peeled the ohne, the cat had started playing with the latest strip. The old man had returned, and as he watched her scold Mimi gently, he gave a jolly laugh. “I’ve never seen a Yadoriko become so attached to a Topsider before.” “Yadoriko? Does that mean cat?” “They’re animals in whom a child of god has come to dwell,” he said, joining her in her task. “They’re raised alongside humans, and when their role comes to an end, they become part of a Quetzal Coatl and live forever.” “A god…?” That couldn’t be, Asuna thought. After all, Mimi was a cat, and they’d lived together since Asuna was little. If she would be mistaken for anything, it would be a fox, but that was only a slight resemblance because of her pointed ears. She couldn’t possibly be a god. “Lucky you, Mimi. He thinks you’re really special.” Mimi responded with a mrowr. “All right.” The man put a pot on the fire, then picked Manna up. “While the food is cooking, would you give Manna a bath?” Asuna’s expression changed to a mixture of surprise and delight. “A bath?!” Curiously, baths in Agartha were just like Japanese-style baths. The stone tub was filled with hot water; aside from the fragrant herbs floating on the surface, it really wasn’t much different from the bath Asuna normally took. “Aaaaaah…” Soaking in hot water up to her shoulders, she exhaled a long sigh. She felt all the fatigue that had accumulated during her long journey through Agartha slipping away. “I love baths,” she said. “?” Manna looked puzzled. Glancing at her, Asuna smiled. “Feels like you’re washing your whole life clean.” Although Manna probably wouldn’t understand that yet, Asuna thought. She’d heard that there were countries in the world—the surface world—where soaking in bathtubs wasn’t a custom. I’m really glad I wasn’t born in one of those, she thought. Baths soothed both your body and your mind at once. She’d heard something about benefits for the parasympathetic nervous system, but frankly, most of it went over her head. That aside… “All right, Manna, let’s get you washed.” Shampoo and conditioner were too much to hope for, but she washed her own and Manna’s hair, and then the rest of them, with Agartha-style soap. After she’d warmed up enough, she changed into the Agarthan clothes the old man had set out for her. The loose garments were made of simple fabric; they looked like traditional clothing from Tibet or somewhere near it (at least if her memory served her right). Up until now, she’d only been able to wash her own clothes in the river, and she’d finally gotten to wash them with soap. Now she had to wait for them to dry. Perhaps unable to wait for Asuna to finish changing, Manna dashed out of the dressing room without even bothering to dry herself off properly. “Manna, no, wait!” As Asuna chased the little girl through the living room, she nearly ran into Morisaki. “Oh, Mr. Morisaki.” In high spirits, Asuna twirled around. “What do you think? Manna’s grandfather loaned me these clothes.” Lately, being grubby had become distressingly normal for Asuna, and now that she was clean and in new clothes, she wanted someone to compliment her. However, Morisaki looked her up and down for a while, as if he was seeing something unusual. Then he said, “They don’t really suit you.” And then he left. “…Oh, honestly. What was that for?”
Chapter 12
17 min read