Common Ground
I was falling. Falling into a darkness so deep it seemed to have no bottom. There had been no resistance of any kind, yet one thing at least was certain: my body was plummeting. I tried to force it to move in that instant, but it would not answer my will — and so I fell, and fell, and kept on falling.
Just when even the waiting had begun to wear me down, the speed of my descent eased by the faintest degree, and only then did my back meet something hard. A floor. I landed with a soft, strengthless thump, and a faint scent brushed the tip of my nose — a scent that seemed to pass straight through my mind. No. Not a scent. Scents.
"Hoh...? A human, finding their way into this place?"
"...A horse?"
It was less a fragrance than a freshness — a scent I had never smelled anywhere in my life. And in the same moment it reached me, so did a voice. My body turned instinctively, and there, in the direction the scent flowed from, stood a pure white horse, shimmering like a leaf riding the wind.
"A human? How did one of those get all the way in here? Did a hole tear open or something?"
That was not the only thing to be wary of. The voice did not belong to just one speaker.
"Don't spout nonsense, Ignil. Nothing could enter this place through a mere hole—"
"Ah! Shut up already, quit your nagging, you wolf bastard!"
"...Both of you, be quiet."
In the darkness, glows of different colors flared to life. Three pairs of eyes — red, blue, and green — drew steadily closer to me. And yet their faces remained invisible. Even with them this near.
"Hey, hey! How did you even get in here?!"
"We have only just met. Is that not rather rude?"
"Why would I mind my manners? You could be an intruder. Hey!! Who are you?!"
Something began prodding at my shoulder. At first it was a light touch, but as time passed the prodding grew harder. That was not all — little by little, the spot it touched seemed to be heating up. When I tried slipping my shoulder away, it followed without tiring.
"Honestly, what is he even looking at? And why won't he answer? Can he not talk?"
"Hmm. He does not appear to be a mute."
The voices and the glows around me were coming into slightly clearer view, but beyond that I could neither see nor sense anything more.
"...That child... he's being rejected."
"Huh? What's that supposed to mean — rejected by whom?"
"Explain it so we can understand, Plante."
Into the ceaseless chatter of those two, a calm yet languid voice slipped between.
"...Him... human. And this place... the Spirit Realm."
"...Could you explain that a little more simply?"
"Hoh. I believe I have figured it out."
"What? Don't talk crap — you're nothing but a wolf!"
Among the voices scuffling back and forth, an unmistakably mocking sneer was mixed in.
As I sat there listening meekly, a palm far smaller than an ordinary person's hand came to rest atop my head — and in that instant, the darkness vanished.
"I have granted you the sight to see us... Well? Can you see us now?"
"Huh? So he couldn't see us this whole time?"
"Is that not obvious? A spirit being visible to human eyes is strange in the first place."
"Y...you didn't know until just now either!!"
Only then did the owners of those three voices enter my sight. A colossal wolf formed of liquid so deeply, impossibly blue that it looked like Fenrir stepped straight out of legend. A tiny girl in a dress that seemed sculpted from living flame, its skirt trailing long behind her. And an adult woman with hair fresh and green as new leaves, gently stroking that girl's head.
Their forms had finally registered in my eyes — and as though she had been waiting for exactly that moment, the little girl came sprinting at me.
"Hey! So who the hell are you?! How did you get in here?!"
"W...wait, hold on.."
"Ignil... stop—"
"Kh...kh...hahahahaha!!"
She came straight for me and, without a word of warning, seized me by the collar and rattled me back and forth; the moment the wolf hurried up to pull her off, another voice behind me burst into loud, unrestrained laughter. Yes — the voice of the very first one I had met.
"Hahahaha... truly, you must stop making me laugh so, Ignil."
"Then what are you laughing at, you damn horse head?!"
"Can you not tell just by looking? Is he not a human sent by Mother?"
At those words, I felt every gaze in the darkness converge on me. The mercy of it was that those gazes carried no hostility. If anything, they brimmed with curiosity — and something close to longing.
The reactions that followed were each their own.
"M...Mother did?!"
"Yes. His aura was steeped in Mother's power from the moment I first laid eyes on him — the information is certain."
The red-haired girl called Ignil made no effort to hide her disbelief, while the great blue wolf wore the expression of one savoring memories from long ago.
"It has been some time since Mother sent a human our way."
"Indeed. It truly has been long."
"...So. What is the business?"
"Mother bestowed her Blessing upon him directly... Well, I would say she means for him to make a contract, no?"
The woman who had been idly toying with fresh green leaves seemed entirely indifferent to it all.
While I stood there frantically observing them, the wolf had somehow come up beside me and licked me across the face.
"Ugh..!"
"Hmm. His affinity with water is passable, I suppose."
"Wh...what? Hey, mutt. You're seriously going to contract with him?"
At the girl's question, the wolf chided her as though it were the most obvious thing in the world. His face looked utterly serious, and her already-large eyes grew wider still.
"Hey! Are you insane? We're Spirit Kings, you know..!"
"What of it? I merely follow Mother's will."
"No..! Even so, for us to contract directly—"
"N...now, just a moment.."
The arguing gazes of blue and red swung to me. The red one seemed to carry an unspoken message — keep your mouth shut and behave — while the blue one simply, genuinely wondered what I was playing at.
"...What do you mean... 'Spirit Kings'?"
"What?"
"Hm? It seems you did not know. All four of us here are Spirit Kings."
"...."
"Well, no wonder you are stunned. From where a human stands, spirits cannot even be seen."
"Ah — about that."
Their true identities so far exceeded anything I had imagined that my voice failed me for a moment — and the pure white horse did not miss that opening, cutting into the conversation.
"That human, it seems, can somehow see spirits?"
"...Say that again."
"...."
Somehow, the atmosphere shifted in an instant. The air that had felt so pleasant a moment before now pressed down with a crushing weight, and my breath caught short in my throat.
"A human... can see spirits? And... Mother sent a creature like that?"
"This jest goes too far, Sylph."
"...Agreed."
Even the woman called Plante, who had kept quietly out of the conversation until then, joined in now — wearing, just like the other Spirit Kings, a faintly displeased look.
"Now, now. Calm yourselves. It is not even confirmed that they sent him."
"Shut up and answer clearly, horse head. Before I burn you to ash."
"How rare. For once, we agree."
The white horse called Sylph tried to soothe them, but the words did not reach them. Behind the little girl called Ignil, flames surged and flickered; behind the wolf as well, droplets of water gathered into razor-sharp blades.
"Calm yourselves. This child is truly nothing to fear."
"...Then explain."
"Tsk, tsk. Such fiery tempers, the pair of you."
I could feel her actually click her tongue, plainly disapproving.
"This child, too, is a victim."
"...What?"
"Do not spout nonsense. Humans have basked in the gods' love since time immemorial—"
"Do you truly believe that?"
The words cut the wolf off mid-sentence, the water droplets he had been raising still hovering around him. Wind began to whip around her, faster and faster.
"If humans are loved by the gods, then what of those who die of starvation, of disaster and calamity? What of those torn apart by monsters, murdered by their own kind, driven by weary lives to take their own?"
"..."
"Could you say that those who died so were simply unloved by the gods? Abandoned wretches?"
"...."
"The gods are petty. Selfish. Hypocritical. We all know this truth far too well."
"...."
"And yet you believe they truly love humans?"
"..Then why would they have raised humans alone as their proxies..!"
"Because they are weak."
From somewhere, a wind began to blow — a fierce, razor-edged gale. The winds rushed straight for her, swallowing her figure from view, and in the same breath a small storm rose up. A moment later, out of that tearing wind came the arms of a delicate, pitiable woman — hair transparent, skin pale and snow-white, proof enough that she was no human. From those small lips spilled words of astonishing cold.
"Humans are creatures who crave something to trust. When they fall into the abyss, do you know what they do to save themselves? They go wandering in search of a being who will become their pillar. They hunt for a prop that demands no price. Perhaps three in ten of them manage to find what they are looking for. And the remaining seven? When they are hounded to the last, the very end — do you know where all of them, without exception, turn to lean? Religion. And god."
"To those driven to the cliff's edge, the gods need only whisper the smallest things — and they are repaid with boundless faith. Where else in all the world could you find an investment so profitable?"
"When they weep and confess their sordid sins, one and all, the merest glimmer of light bestowed from above fills them with emotion and happiness."
"Even when their faithful wield a god's power to gratify their own petty greed, the devotion gained thereby far outweighs whatever divine authority such abuse costs them."
"No creature in existence repays a debt of grace so richly as humans do. Who would refuse to keep a pet that showers them with affection far beyond its keep for nothing more than an occasional treat? This alone should make the reason those beings favor humans obvious — do you not think so?"
"...What, then? Do the two of you intend to do the same? Do you long to return to those days? To forget everything that happened and fawn over them aga—"
In an instant, the entire space fell silent. Was it her voice, so cold it stung? Or the emotion packed into each and every word? No one present dared to address her carelessly. She looked so fragile that the slightest touch might shatter her.
"...."
"...My apologies. I let myself grow too heated."
Sweeping her hair back from her face in a single motion, she pointed straight at me.
"What I wished to say is this: that child stands in the same position we do."
"...?"
Following her finger, three pairs of eyes turned upon me. For a moment I wilted under those differently colored pupils — but only a moment.
"...Are you saying that I... have something in common with the likes of Spirit Kings?"
"Yes."
"What in the world could we possibly..."
She let out a short snort of amusement and thrust her face up close to mine; seen at such range, her expression seemed to ask how I could possibly have missed it. Then she drew back and pressed a fingertip to my chest.