Shizuku had woken up to this particular surprise several times before, but seeing it that day was a shock. Clutching her groggy head, she called out to the man who was sitting in a chair reading a book. “Erik…?” “Oh. Good morning.” “Huh? Uh… Did you stay up all night?! I’m so sorry!” “It’s nothing to worry about. I was just reading.” The previous night, Shizuku’s fear surrounding her strange situation had driven her to ask for Erik’s help, but she’d never expected him to stay up all night. She leaped out of bed in a panic and bowed her head. Mea was also in the room, and she was just serving Erik his breakfast. It wasn’t clear whether she’d slept or not. As Shizuku’s assistant demon left the room, she said, “I’ll bring some for you, too, Master.” Once she was gone, Shizuku turned back to Erik. “S-so what happened?” “Nothing. You slept fine.” “Aghhhhh, I’m so sorry!” Shizuku squatted down and covered her face, which had instantly turned bright red. It was extremely embarrassing that Erik had watched her all night and nothing had ended up happening. She wanted to roll around on the floor in agony. “I-I’ll make it up to you someday…” “You don’t have to. It’s no big deal.” Erik was sipping his tea and reading a navy-blue book. Once he finished his light breakfast, he stood up, casually raising the book to show it to Shizuku. “Well, I’m going to borrow this. Let me know if anything happens.” “Oh, okay! Thank you!” The man showed no sign of exhaustion or discontent as he left, and she watched him go, holding her reddened cheeks. When Mea came back, Shizuku frowned with confusion. “That book he borrowed… Is that one of mine?” The answer to that question had already submerged itself deep inside Shizuku. She had no memory of what had happened and no way to recall it. Mea smiled sadly. “Come now, Master, please have something to eat. I’m sure you have another busy day ahead of you.” And with that, another uneventful day began. A new paper cover had been put on the navy-blue book. Erik had made it from some paper he’d found to hide the leather cover. Putting paper covers on books wasn’t customary in Erik’s world, but he’d made a number of them by now, having been inspired by the ones he’d seen on books from Shizuku’s world. Erik carried on reading in the privacy of his room, summarizing the contents of the book on paper as he went. He organized the information into a table, noting which country and what time in history each part of the book referred to, while skim-reading the detailed passages. Deciding to take a rest after finishing a chapter, he closed his weary eyes. “I should have known there was more than one book…” He’d realized there were gaps in this book’s knowledge as he’d been making his notes. It wasn’t that specific countries, regions, or eras were missing entirely; accounts of a time period would describe events that occurred in certain countries and omit those that happened elsewhere, while particular eras of a country’s history might be covered and others ignored. Such haphazard and incomplete coverage was unusual for a history book. Regardless, the contents were arranged in chronological order. Erik had managed to confirm that much, even though there was no table of contents or index. “The missing sections must be in another book…” He knew about the red book, at least. Erik tried to discern a pattern that linked the omitted sections, but he had yet to find one. It was as if pieces of history had been picked at random, like children fighting over a bowl of candies trying to grab whatever treats they could get. Still, there were two things that were undeniably intriguing. Firstly, some of the accounts from ancient times contradicted one another. The earliest sections of the book—which dated to around a century before the Dark Age—were among the oldest known records. Multiple contradictory versions of these accounts appeared, spanning a period of roughly eleven hundred years that ended about three centuries ago. The very beginning of the book, for example, claimed that an elder brother had ascended the throne after a succession dispute, whereas the second time this story was told had the younger brother stealing the throne from his brother. The last of the several different versions most closely aligned with the “history” Erik knew. There weren’t just one or two contradictory accounts, either. The majority of the first half of the book was filled with them. There were no page numbers, so it was hard to know for sure, but it also seemed to have a lot more pages than one would expect at first glance. If someone who didn’t know about the book read it, it would come off as a confusing mix of historical records, some hypothetical and some true. Erik, however, had an idea as to why things were so incomprehensible. “Could these be…erased experiments?” The owner of the missing red book claimed that the continent was a testing ground, and that the books chronicled experiments that had been erased from history. If these were records of such experiments, it meant that history had been repeatedly overwritten. It seemed like these experiments had ended about three hundred years ago, as only one version of each historical event was reported from that point onward, but even if it had happened in the distant past, it was unsettling to think that history had been manipulated. Staring at a spell diagram on the page, Erik let out a frustrated sigh. There was no record of a forbidden curse like that in Farsas’s archives, and according to the version of history he was familiar with, it wasn’t even supposed to exist. “There’s one other thing that’s bothering me…” If he hadn’t been paying such close attention, the overlapping versions of history would have hidden it from view, but the table he’d made to check the time and location of each of the records had helped him realize something. The number of “omitted sections” began to decrease after a certain period at the beginning of the Dark Age. Until that point, Erik estimated that the book included about a third of all historical accounts, and if Shizuku’s claim about there being three books was correct, one could surmise that the accounts were distributed equally among the three books. After that, however, the book seemed to chronicle about half of everything that happened. Why was that? Erik racked his brains, trying to remember what had happened on the continent at that point in time: the establishment of what would become the magic kingdom, the appearance of spirit sorcerers, the turmoil in the east of the continent, the development of weapons, the improvement of sailing ships, the creation of highways, the spread of belief in Aetea, and— “…Is that it?” The next thought that entered Erik’s head, as well as the deductions that followed, left him at a loss for words. He felt vacant, almost dazed. The conclusion he’d come to was hard to believe. Any ordinary person might have been crushed by the emptiness Erik was feeling, but he just tamped it down. Erik sighed and took out the portrait wedged into the book after the last page. It had been there when he’d borrowed the book from Shizuku. It depicted two people, likely a husband and wife. Erik knew who they were. “They look a lot like…Lyshien and Oscar.” The princess of a fallen kingdom and her protector. Why had their picture been inside this book? Apparently, Lyshien had spent a while in Rozsark after her country crumbled. This book had also been in Rozsark, so it was certainly possible the portrait been drawn during that time. Still, the version of Lyshien in the picture looked several years older than she did in real life. A spell had been placed on the picture to stop it from deteriorating, so it was probably pretty old. It made more sense to assume that the portrait was of one of Lyshien’s ancestors. Why would someone go out of their way to put a picture like that in this book? Erik wondered to himself. “She said not to let Farsas get hold of it, huh…?” The clues led Erik to one conceivable possibility—but not only did he lack the resources to prove it, the risks were huge. It was probably wise to leave it alone for the time being. First, he had to verify his hypothesis regarding the accounts it contained. After putting the portrait back in the book, Erik put it on the shelf and set a barrier to prevent anyone from touching it. He gathered up his notes spread out on the desk, then trotted out of the room. Shizuku awoke at the same time every day, even when nobody woke her up. She’d been like that for as long as she could remember. After washing her face with cold water, she started to comb her hair. Ever since the day she’d asked Erik for advice, Shizuku had stopped “staying up late.” This came as a relief to Mea, too, who had woken her master up the past few days by saying, “It seems you slept well.” Shizuku was probably the most well-rested she’d been since arriving in her new world. Thanks to that, she’d been feeling pretty good. Shizuku looked at the list of things she had to do that day as she quickly dressed herself and got ready for work. “Okay, I’m off! See you at lunch.” “Have a good day.” Shizuku left the room, carrying a bundle of documents under her arm. In the past, knee-length clothing had felt easier to move in, but lately she’d found herself more comfortable wearing ankle-length skirts, likely as a result of the formal clothing she’d had to wear in Kisk. She looked up at the sunny sky through the window and stifled a yawn. Shizuku had been back in Farsas for a month and she’d already produced a range of learning materials, including several flashcard sets and picture books. Most of these were inspired by her successes in Kisk, but she’d started to wonder whether the flashcards, initially targeted at young children, could be adapted to help older children learn compound words, too. Moreover, when Shizuku had asked if there were any tools she could use to record and play back audio, she was told that there was a magic implement that could do this, so she’d started thinking about those kinds of learning resources as well. With only one month left on Erik’s contract, she wanted to try everything she could think of. When Shizuku arrived at the lab, she was surprised to find an unexpected person there. “Lera. What’s the matter? Is there something wrong with the picture book?” It was the first time Lera had come to Shizuku’s lab, so her presence startled Shizuku. She wondered whether there was a problem, but Lera just smiled. “No. I have some good news… We might have found a potential treatment for the disease.” “What?! Really?” exclaimed Shizuku, eager to hear the details. Lera gave her explanation, a slightly troubled smile on her face. They still didn’t know the cause of the disease. However, after Erik had suggested that the soul and language might not be related, Lera and the other researchers had started taking a different direction with some of the experiments. Working under the assumption that the disease might be caused by some sort of infection, one of these experiments had involved gathering children around the age of ten—an age when kids had already acquired more than half of their innate language skills—and having them interact with younger children. As these experiments were repeated, some changes were observed in the children. More specifically, the younger children who were symptomatic began to regain their innate language skills. “Wait, are you suggesting that this change isn’t because the younger children learned from speaking to the older ones?” “Obviously, that’s one possibility. But we also instructed the older children not to use certain words, and even got them to sit in the same room without speaking at all. In both cases, the younger children got their language skills back. We’re currently investigating whether the magical force field placed in the room during the experiments had an effect. Still, this is a significant breakthrough in itself, right? We hadn’t found any clues until now.” “That’s amazing… Congratulations!” Was this the first step in unraveling the mysteries of innate language? Shizuku was eager to know more. Lera noticed Shizuku’s enthusiasm and promised she’d give her a summarized report of the results later on. Then she explained her main motive for swinging by. “Could you pass on my gratitude to Erik? I’ve gone to thank him in person, but he never seems to be in his lab lately.” “He doesn’t?” Now that Shizuku thought about it, she hadn’t seen Erik since the night she’d gone to ask for his help. She didn’t realize he hadn’t been in his lab; that was incredibly strange. Shizuku nodded, agreeing to pass on the message. Once Lera had left, Shizuku couldn’t help but frown. It felt for a moment like something she couldn’t recall was threatening to resurface, as if there was an amorphous anxiety looming in the back of her mind. And yet, like sand slipping through her fingers, the feeling was quickly buried deep inside her. All she was left with was that desert landscape. Shizuku thought back to when she’d looked up at the sky, having first arrived in this world, and could almost feel the heat. Her head felt hazy, and she vigorously shook her head to try to clear it.
Chapter 44
12 min read