The Apothecary of Hameln
A village of kind people, a rarity these days. Our destination was Bremen. It was a pleasant enough journey, walking through several villages, the crunch of gravel under my soles providing a rhythmic, romantic backdrop to the trek. It had been days since we left the Eternal Forest, and I had remained in a state of high alert, fully prepared for the pursuers, assassins, and bounty hunters I expected to swarm us. Yet, against all expectations, they never came. We had encountered the occasional pack of wild dogs, bandits, or thugs, but compared to the dangers I had anticipated, they were lighter than feathers.
"By the way, do you have any sort of self-destruct mechanism? You know, something that triggers if you press a button remotely?"
"I am not entirely certain. I do not possess a complete understanding of my own design and structure. I cannot definitively say that I do not have one. I do not know exactly what Geppetto was thinking when he created me, either."
The assassination machine from the future that Hansel remembered hadn't had such a thing, but I’d asked just in case. Even the killing machine herself didn't know if she contained a self-destruct device.
"How can you not know about your own body?"
"Gretel, you speak as if you could point to the exact location of your internal organs and the veins within them. Can you pinpoint the precise center of your own heart?"
"...Point taken."
"Precisely."
Having heard that, Gretel drove an arrow she’d been holding into the spot where the heart of a wild dog—which had been foaming at the mouth after a kick to the jaw—would have been.
Upon arriving in the village, our first priority was to find the local doctor and apothecary, and a decent inn. According to the villagers we asked, the inn most frequented by outsiders was a place with a rather fancy name: Somnus's Dream. As for the village's only pharmacy and clinic, it was run by the person who used to serve as the village head. Apparently, a long time ago, that doctor had left, claiming he would return shortly after treating some patients who had traveled from afar, but he had never come back. Since his departure, one of the orphans he had taken in had continued to serve as the village's doctor and apothecary. They said she was skilled, and her heart was as kind as the old doctor's, so we should go there for cheap medicine.
When I asked another village woman, I got a similar answer. She was such a kind child, treating the villagers and helping them even after her teacher left. An old man even teared up, wondering where that teacher had gone, leaving the girl he’d raised like a daughter to suffer alone for years.
"Where on earth did Dr. Billock go, leaving that child to lose her parents twice over!"
Synthesizing the information, Gretel gave her one-line review: "From what I've heard, that Dr. Billock sounds like a genuinely rare, kind person."
But I remained skeptical. "We don't know yet. A girl left all alone in a rural village. For all we know, the village itself could be a twisted sex-den, and the villagers might be using her like a sex slave. Who knows? Maybe the girl playing doctor is doing it all with her body, kissing one grandfather with the same mouth she used to suck the ass of the neighbor next door."
My speculation went beyond the ordinary.
"If it were just a story told by children who don't know any better, I might agree. But considering that the adults—who are old enough to know that it's dangerous to let outsiders know about such things—are the ones telling us about his foster daughter and suggesting we get medicine from her, your theory seems a bit excessive. So, if this village really is a '...twisted...sex-den' as you say, what do you intend to do?"
Pinocchia was taken aback by my creative word choice and hypothetical scenario, but she asked for my policy on the matter, as it wasn't entirely impossible.
"I don't know. I'll decide once we get there and see for ourselves."
There was no need to pre-emptively label the villagers as monsters, nor to turn the orphaned apothecary into a victim of heinous sexual crimes.
"Welcome. Who... oh, you're travelers? Nice to meet you! I have potions and antidotes for travelers, and I can also take a look if you're feeling unwell. My name is Sophia. How can I help you?"
The owner of the pharmacy smelled of sweet and bitter herbs. There was no sign of the resignation, sorrow, or wariness toward strangers that a victim of sexual abuse would show. She was a spirited girl, standing tall and living her life, guarding the small pharmacy and clinic her precious foster father had left behind, even in the sad reality of having lost her parents and having her foster father never return. There was no hint of her being mistreated; my worries about how to help a frail woman suffering in a small, closed-off society were entirely unfounded. It was a truly quiet, peaceful village with happy daily lives.
I suppose it shouldn't be surprising that such a quiet, ordinary village exists, even if it's common knowledge that people's temperaments easily turn ugly and they transform into villains without even realizing it. Having seen so many pickpockets, robbers, kidnappers, and people trying to swindle the disabled when I visited other villages and small towns with my father, Robin Hood, and recalling the various incidents I’d seen in my previous life, I felt ashamed that I was the one more steeped in evil.
"Geez, Hansel, really."
Gretel laughed and poked me in the side. Having nothing to say, I just gave an awkward laugh and looked away. 'If you're so curious about the sex-den thing, I'll show you later.' That poke in the side had implied as much.
Pinocchia, watching their quiet display of affection, sighed and turned her body away. It was amusing to watch, but it got old if you saw it too often.
"I'll wait outside for a bit. It's not like the medicine or treatments sold here mean anything to me, anyway."
After Pinocchia left, I asked, "Is it okay for her to go out?"
"No, it's fine. Anyway, we need to buy a few things, so could you recommend some good ones?"
The siblings asked the doctor and apothecary—who had introduced herself as Sophia—about the potions and dried herbs on display. For the first time in a while, it was a comfortable conversation, free of wariness or distrust.
"By the way, everyone? You said you were heading to Bremen, right? In that case... I have a favor to ask... I'll give you the potions for cheaper, so could you please do me a favor?"
"A favor?"
Whenever someone says the word "favor," it feels suspicious, even if you know them. It's even worse when it comes from a stranger. I'd seen cases where people accepted what they thought was a simple letter delivery, only to find themselves acting as messengers for major criminals, delivering a rude declaration of war and getting stabbed to death at the destination. Gretel wanted to refuse immediately. They didn't look like pickpockets or back-alley thugs, but given how the world worked, there were plenty of cases where things were full of good intentions but resulted only in malice.
But I said, "Let's hear it first."
I could have refused right away, but I was of the mind to at least listen. I was, after all, someone who was called a hero and a beacon of hope; if it wasn't harmful after I looked into it, I was willing to help.
Seeing Gretel's displeased expression, Sophia shrank back, but seeing that I was still calm, she gathered the courage to speak.
"If you're going to Bremen, could you please look for a man named Billock? He's my father."
The story I’d heard from the villagers earlier was repeated, this time from the perspective of the daughter who had seen it up close.
"It's been over ten years. A lot of people who looked like they were in terrible pain came to find him, and my father packed up a bunch of things to go help them..."
"Hmm, if it was ten years ago, Sophia, you would have been no taller than our knees. He left a young daughter in charge of the entire clinic and pharmacy work?"
Even if he had left for a noble cause, this was child abandonment and neglect. How could he leave a child in charge of difficult work that involved treating people and mixing medicine, where other people's lives were at stake? I lowered my opinion of this "Billock" character significantly.
"Yes. It wasn't very difficult work."
One thing I didn't know: Sophia had been born with a natural talent for medicine and pharmacy. After losing her parents at a young age, the talent that might have withered away was nurtured by a man named Billock, who had served as the village head, until it grew into a towering tree. Even though she had reduced the operating hours and the types of medicine she handled after Billock left, she had enough skill to live well enough, managing the pharmacy and clinic on her own. Hearing her speak so nonchalantly about doing doctor's work alone from a young age—as if it were just light weeding—left me speechless.
"Anyway, we're going to be in Bremen for a while, so we'll look for this Billock person. But don't get your hopes up too high. By the way, didn't you ask anyone else for this favor?"
If he’d been out of contact for this long, he was likely dead. Sophia guessed as much. Even so, she wanted to know for sure. Whether he was dead or alive, what kind of end he’d met, or if his story was still ongoing.
"...I've asked a few times, but no one ever came back with an answer. And although you're people I've just met, I haven't seen anyone who looked as kind as you."
It seemed Sophia had a good eye for people, not just for medicine and patients. She had accurately identified the heroes who would help and save those in need, and had asked for their help.
"Don't expect too much from us, either. We'll be staying in Bremen for a while, so we'll look into it while we're there. Anyway, we need to go get some rest now."
After getting various potions, antidotes, and ointments at a discount in exchange for the simple task of checking on a man's whereabouts, I turned to leave.
"I want to sleep quietly without having to stand guard. That man said earlier, right? That the inn here was decent. What was it called again?"
I didn't want to experience nodding off during guard duty only to be startled by a moth, or have a bug crawl down my back from the tree I was leaning against again.
"Somnus's Dream."
"Right, that was the name. Come to think of it, he said they had a restaurant there, too. Huh? What's wrong?"
Sophia had finished the name of the inn that Gretel couldn't recall. But the atmosphere had changed. The warm, friendly girl who had greeted us with a sales-pitch smile and chatted away was gone. What I saw now was similar to the look of someone trembling from the sexual violence and exploitation that I had worried might be happening in the village. She was undoubtedly trembling in fear of something.
"There are no patients right now, so please just stay here for the night. I won't charge you for the room, so don't go there."