The Trial
…What is that supposed to mean?
Little by little, she came toward me — still slumped down where she knelt in front of my feet. The moment those bright yellow pupils drew near, my body shrank back on its own, flinching like a herbivore standing before a beast of prey.
"I trust you have some idea what I'm getting at?"
….
"Yes. That's exactly it. The side effects."
Words rose before my mind's eye. Words I had seen before, in the status window.
The eyes carry a dragon's will.
It will test you without end.
And it may yet try to take your body.
'…Wait. That's what it meant?'
"Well, normally we could never meet like this. It should have ended with nothing more than my voice reaching your ears."
"…Then why can we?"
"No idea."
…?
"Whether it's chance or the power of that status window you spoke of, I couldn't say — but you've been pulled into the Mindscape, and as far as I'm concerned, that's all the better. Here, I don't have to worry about eyes from outside."
Her pupils lengthened once more, and the faintest trace of menace began to seep from them. At her last words my stomach turned to ice, and a single bead of cold sweat slid down my cheek.
Then her finger snapped once, and something began to ring out through the air around us.
"Th… this is…?"
"Ah, hold still. It's nothing bad."
The crystals around us moved. No — they were vibrating. Every crystal that had bloomed like flowers across the chamber was showing the very same reaction.
And then they rose — the crystals blossoming from the floor. Crystals of every shape and hue, embedded in the black floor and walls, lifted skyward all at once, each blazing with light to match its color as they came flying straight at me.
One. Two. Three. The crystals kept piling higher. Even ones that had been invisible to the eye bloomed up out of the ground and soared, stacking layer upon layer as if sculpting themselves into a mountain.
"…What the hell is this."
…?
"What kind of life have you even lived? No — first things first. Are you actually human?" She spoke while staring at the tower of crystals spread out before me, vast as a mountain — and somehow, her voice carried more bewilderment than it had a moment before.
"You're telling me a mere short-lived species has this many memories?"
…?
"And that's with every last one of them hand-picked from only the worst, cruelest memories there are?"
"Hold on, what's that supposed to—"
"That can't be right… wait. Why in the world are there seven of those?"
With her last words, her gaze locked onto something. An inexplicably sharp stare fixed on the very bottom of the crystal tower.
And there, just as she'd said, sat exactly seven black crystals — every one of them a different size.
"…Hey. You. What the fuck are you?"
"Kgh… khhk… wh-what's gotten into you, all of a sudden—"
"You're unmistakably human. Your face, your scent — everything about you says human."
An unseen force closed around my throat and hoisted me into the air. I grabbed at it in a panic, but formless energy offered nothing to seize. All I could do was pray, silent and helpless.
"So why, then, do you carry so many black crystals?"
"Kh… hah…"
"Oh, you can't understand a word I'm saying? Then let me explain. Nicely."
The Mindscape. An unconscious realm woven from a single life's memories, experiences, and heart — and the place where that heart lies more bare than anywhere else in existence.
"When I first arrived here, ahead of you, my first thought was: what is all this supposed to be?"
….
"I had never once heard of a Mindscape with nothing but black writhing across it."
"Khhk…!"
"You do know a Mindscape's atmosphere mirrors the whole life its owner has lived? It lays bare the mindset they carried through their years, the emotions they harbored — for anyone to read."
The grip on my throat tightened further, and her hair undulated once more. Nor was that all: small horns were pushing out from her head, and her fair skin was slowly peeling away to reveal scales beneath.
"And every single crystal in this place represents one memory, one experience, one thought, driven deep into the mind."
….
"Every person's experiences and memories differ, so their colors can't help but span a thousand shades — and yet among them, there is exactly one color that appears in every human being. No — in every living thing."
She drew closer to where I hung in the air, holding out her vertically slit pupil and an arm that had, at some point, become sheathed entirely in scales.
"Birth and death. Save for a very few exceptions, it is the one color everyone possesses only once."
….
"So what are you?"
By then she stood below me, looking up — idly tapping a finger against the tip of a horn grown to its full length.
"Seven black crystals — the color of the moment of dying, something a soul experiences only at the very end of its life?"
….
"A mere human. A creature with, at the very best, a finite life — how is it that you keep dying?"
Her voice changed. A voice that sent a chill crawling over every inch of my skin came spilling from her small mouth.
"You don't hunger for life. One look at this place's atmosphere makes that plain. And yet eternal death has never arrived for you either. A contradiction — a perfect contradiction."
"…Khh… kh."
"And from what I know, only one kind of being fits that description. Things that grant power to their own creations, make the rest called death turn away from them, and suck their faith dry — parasites, every last one."
….
"Gods. What is your connection to them?"
Ash began to spread from her mouth. Ash like black mist.
Ominous ash — the kind that looked as though a single breath of it would kill me on the spot — filled the black space from wall to wall, and as the pressure left my throat, my body plummeted.
I hit the floor with a thud, a dull shock rolling through me, ragged breaths sawing in and out of my mouth. And from the shoulders of the woman who had watched the whole thing unfold, a pair of wings rose — wings torn to shreds like rags, fluttering as though they were a tattered cloak.
"…Well. It doesn't matter, does it."
"…Huh?"
Then it was gone — that pressure, daunting to a startling degree. The searing ash scattered before it could cling to my body, the ragged wings vanished, and the horns that had grown from her head left not so much as a trace behind.
"…Sorry. I got worked up over nothing."
….
"Let's put the talking off and start with the test — neither of us is in any mood for conversation right now anyway."
"…Test?"
"Yes. To see whether you qualify."
…?
"The original plan was simply to take your body… but I've changed my mind."
The language of dragons was reality itself — phenomenon, truth, and mystery incarnate. And above all else, it was a dragon's alone.
"No species may take what is ours without leave. Had one ever caught the eyes of our kind, it would have been torn limb from limb."
….
"And yet, on rare occasions, there were those who wielded Dragon Speech."
Dragonians, the distant descendants of dragons — and those named the Dragon's Kin. The only living beings who could ever draw close to a dragon.
"You are no Dragonian; that much is certain. Which leaves exactly one path, doesn't it?"
….
"To become Kin is to pass a dragon's trial. And every dragon's trial is its own."
The crystal tower, silent until now, shuddered — then came crashing down. And rose once more: the black crystals that had anchored the tower's base.
"My trial is simple."
"…Which is?!"
"Endure. Don't lose consciousness. Keep only that in mind, and the rest will take care of itself."
The black crystals suspended in the air came hurtling at me — no warning at all, at a speed far too great.
I couldn't dodge the black crystal, and the instant it struck me, the scenery changed. And she was gone — the woman who had stood before me with her arms crossed.
In the same breath my body turned transparent, and color came blooming beautifully over the black-drowned world around me. Color gave rise to substance, conjured the sense of touch, and switched sight on.
"…Who are you? Who set this in motion? Under whose orders did you do this?"
The moment sight awakened, smell and touch followed. Blood still warm — as if it had just been spilled — slapped wet against my hand. The skin-crawling screech of metal on metal teased at my ears, and the stink of rusted iron and fresh blood dragged a memory up from long ago.
"Let's see if you can endure this one too?!!"
"Uuuggh… AAAAAGH!!"
A cluster of pokers stood jutting from a furiously burning blaze. Beside them, arranged in neat rows, lay tools made for splitting and tearing. Some had plainly seen use already; blood they hadn't been wiped clean of still trickled down their lengths. However charitably you looked at it, this was a scene of torture in progress.
Whether because of the past, my head abruptly began to ache as though it would split. Clutching that splitting skull, I barely managed to turn toward the sound of movement — and found a man bringing something down at a chair again and again. Blood spattered with every blow; he was clearly still at work. And the figure bound to that chair, taking the torture before him, was—
"I told you, I don't know. Why can't you get that through your skull?"
"Loyalty, from an assassin? Now there's a first."
"No… heh — I'm telling you, I really don't know."
It was me. The me of long ago — the me who was betrayed by Number Eight… no, Jill, and died under torture back then.
Even reeling from the scene unfolding before my eyes, only one phrase would surface in my mind.
'Just endure. Don't lose consciousness. Keep only that in mind, and the rest will take care of itself.'
"…Hah. So that's what she meant."
She had said it — endure. She had said it — black is the color of death. Which meant, in a word—
'…She's telling me to go through death itself without blacking out… Ugh!!'
"Go on!! Let's see!! How long you can keep being a stubborn little fuck right to the very end!!"
Every time he brought it down on my head, 'my' head ached in exactly the same measure. A club — the kind studded all over with nails, the kind street thugs swagger around with — slammed into my skull. It cracked, blood poured out, and it felt as though the nails had split the bone clean through.
Then, in succession, my body was beaten. Indiscriminately. Wham. Crack. Squelch — sound after sound burst from the man's club, and those horrifying noises echoed through the cramped little room.
"Tch — hey!! Is no one there?!"
"Pff… heh… and what if I do break, hmm?"
"…You still look in one piece. What a relief."
After those words, the violence went on — a beating dealt with fists instead of a club. Flesh broke and tore all over, and groans of agony began to ring out like music.
But to the very end, 'I' did not lose consciousness. If anything, the man was the one who wore himself out and left first. And 'I', for my part, had endured to the very end as well.
'Hoo… hhh…'
"Tch — of all the stubborn bastards to run into…!"
"…Kah… h… fuck… you. It fucking… hurts—"
"Rest a little, such as it is. You'll want your strength left for screaming."
The door opened briefly, then shut — the man kicking his way out without a backward glance. And in that same instant, the scenery around me shifted once more, changing as utterly as the view on either side of that door.
Snow pouring down in sheets; a street swept by an icy wind. A night embroidered with beautiful stars. And beneath that lovely moonlight, one small child shining alone.
The clothes hanging off the child were closer to rags than garments, and grime caked the unwashed body from head to toe. A child huddled with knees drawn up and hugged tight, clinging to whatever warmth remained, trying however it could to outlast the cold.
….
'…Ha. Fuck.'
That child was me, too.