A rainbow appears around the sun whenever good weather sticks around a while. Seeing it as a child, I always found it strange that a rainbow would appear without any rain preceding it. This rainbow is known as a “sunsushy.”
It is primarily caused by the air temperature reaching a certain threshold, causing the heat of the sun and the mana in the natural world to clash. Apparently, depending on the amount of light, the human eye can perceive said clash as colors. The conditions have to be ideal for this to occur, which is why you’ll only see it on days with clear weather and a perfect balance of the sun’s heat and the air temperature. So rather than saying this rainbow appears “whenever good weather persists,” it is perhaps less misleading to say it only appears on days when all the conditions are perfect.
“...And that about sums it up. Was that clear?” I finish my explanation.
“Hmm... I dunno... So basically, when the sun shines bright?”
“That’s right.”
I find myself answering the question posed by a little girl brought to the guild by her sorcerer father. She’s evidently curious about sunsushies after one appeared yesterday. Children of sorcerers often come here, to the client reception area where I’m currently staffing a counter, to pass the time while their parents choose their assignments. And because the client area is unfortunately deserted today, it’s a good way of passing the time for me as well.
The girl looks about three years old. Her bangs leap up and down as she runs back to her father with a grin, holding her cheeks and exclaiming that she wants to see a rainbow. The father in question seems to have finished choosing his work—he pats the girl’s head and bows to me. I respond in kind and bid him farewell before returning to my work.
Figuring I could use the opportunity while there’s nobody on the other side of my counter to pick out the requests that need preliminary investigation, I begin sorting the pile of papers the director’s entrusted to me.
Also, I have to say... For a three-year-old to go asking grown-ups in detail about sunsushies? I predict she’ll become a diligent student in the future. When I was little, sure, I would go, “It’s so pretty!” and I would want to see it again, but I never asked the adults when it could be seen.
As I sit there being impressed, suddenly, vibrations in the ground rock my counter. An earthquake?
“Yo yo yo yo Nanalie, this is real bad!!!” In comes Satanás at full tilt, his steps ringing out through the room.
So that’s what was causing those vibrations. Has he no shame? I wish he wouldn’t go running into my workplace shouting my name like that. Seeing his flustered state, I direct a chilly, questioning stare at him, but he doesn’t seem to care at all as he approaches my counter.
“Wh-What is it?”
Waving off the sorcerers who came running to investigate all the racket, he brings his remarkably sweaty face close to mine, abruptly grabs me by the arm, and pulls me up on top of the counter.
“Stop that! What do you think you’re doing?! Let me go!”
Ow ow ow! What’s come over him all of a sudden? I try to wriggle myself free, but he just goes and drags a helpless girl (me) off the counter, at which point I decide to break my old resolution not to use strength-enhancing spells on guild premises. I ready my finger, but he ever so slightly dislocates it before I can cast anything. What the hell?! How terrible can this man be?!
I cover my injured finger with my other hand and start blowing on it.
“Just come! You gotta come!”
“Don’t you think you should at least apologize for this?! And hold on, I’m at work right now!”
In response to my complaint, Satanás thrusts his hand out towards my injured finger and casts a healing spell, then looks at me as if to say, “Happy now?” What do you think? Of course not!
My coworkers gather around us, saying he can’t just go carrying me out of here, but he pays them no heed and presses onward.
“You there, mind passing word to the director that Nanalie will be leaving early today due to an emergency?”
“Don’t you go deciding things for me!”
Now he pulls an arm around my neck and starts dragging me that way. I can’t breathe! And while I wonder whether he’s really gone and lost it, and is looking to kill me, I also start considering what put him in this state to begin with.
Satanás puts me astride his phoenix familiar waiting outside, mounts up, and instructs it to “quickly return to the forest,” patting it on the back. As it utters a cry and spreads its wings, I frantically cling to its neck. Riding it feels pretty different from riding Lala, and I struggle to position myself well as we soar higher and higher into the sky.
“I think we found that thing Noir and his buddies are looking for!”
Taken aback by the fact he still calls Prince Zenon “Noir,” I tilt my head in response to a different part of what he said.
“What thing?”
“The Time Keeper!”
“What?!”
If true, Satanás is the one who’ll get the credit for finding it, and I don’t understand why he went to me with this information ahead of the knights. I didn’t even know he knew about that doll. Benjamine must have told him, or more likely Prince Zenon himself, judging by what he said earlier.
“Why not just go straight to the knights?”
“There’s something I gotta check first!” he replies, sounding like he’s scolding me.
What did I ever do to him?
“You better be ready. It probably couldn’t get any worse for you,” warns Satanás, pushing up his hair and looking visibly frustrated.
“Couldn’t get any worse for me”? I’m left wondering what he means, scratching my cheek and pouting.
✦ ✦ ✦
“So how are you able to turn back time, sir?”
“Why, that is because I’m so great!”
“Wow! You must be the best magician in the world!”
“Heh heh heh heh!”
Brought deep into the forest by Satanás, I find myself near a clearing, where Benjamine fawns over a tiny old man in a pointy hat. A baffling sight.