11. Wonderland (39)
11. Wonderland (39)
In Wonderland, death wasn't a heavy subject. Death days were celebrated much like birthdays, and causes of death served as standard small talk once conversation ran dry.
Solane's casual smile as she spoke of her child's death was enough to unsettle any living person.
But Reina had been here long enough to have seen events like the "Death Moment Imitation Contest." What shook her was something else entirely—the content of what her mother had said.
She couldn't comprehend her mother's words.
I died?
No, Mom only found that out after I was dead?
She shook her head.
It was absurd.
Refuting it would have been simple. All she had to do was take off her mask. But she couldn't bring herself to do it. She was afraid her mother wouldn't recognize her. No, she was terrified of what else might come out of her mother's mouth.
As she hesitated, Young Reina, who had been watching quietly, interjected.
"You're talking about that time, right? Mommy, you were so mean!"
"I'm sorry. Mommy will apologize again, okay?"
Young Reina pretended to sulk, turning her head away with a huff. Feeling the older Reina's gaze on her, she walked over and shielded her mouth with the back of her hand, whispering loudly enough for their mother to hear perfectly well.
"You know, miss. When I was stuck to Mommy's body, I saw something scary."
I've never seen anything scarier than you.
Reina suppressed the urge to shove her younger self away and spoke.
"What was it?"
"A fake Reina."
At those words, Reina felt something heavy drop into the pit of her stomach.
Her trembling hands clenched into fists. She barely managed to steady her breathing before opening her mouth.
"A fake...?"
"Yeah! I was stuck right next to Mommy, but she kept calling the fake Reina her daughter. It made me sad."
"I don't remember that time very clearly, but I think the shock of losing my child made me mistake some other girl for my daughter. For years."
Reina wanted to deny her mother's words.
Some other girl? No, no.
I'm your daughter. What are you talking about?
Then how do you explain it? The photos of me with Mom. The person in those photos is definitely... definitely...
"It's not weird that Mommy was fooled! Because she looked exactly like me."
The expected reply made Reina feel physically ill.
Her mouth moved on its own now, independent of her will.
"...What happened to that child?"
Call it resentment or hatred, it didn't matter. She wanted to hear her mother's thoughts about her. She wanted an answer about the four years of memories they had built together.
But that hope was trampled just as ruthlessly.
"I don't know. Honestly, it's more accurate to say I wasn't interested. I felt so guilty toward my daughter that I deliberately avoided thinking about it, so I forgot all about the fake one within a few months of arriving here."
"Heehee, I told her to. I said I wouldn't forgive her otherwise!"
The two looked at each other and burst out laughing.
They were the picture of a blissfully happy mother and daughter.
There was no place for her beside them. There never had been.
"Oh dear. We've talked about ourselves far too much. By the way, miss, what was your name?"
"What's your name, miss?"
Both of them looked at her. Their faces held pure curiosity, yet they seemed ready to devour her.
"I'm..."
Her breathing grew ragged.
Fourteen years of living as Reina had been denied.
A fake who looked just like her.
She had endured ten years of misery by clinging to the memory of four happy years, and now...
-Never bring up the old days again!
-Honestly, it's more accurate to say I wasn't interested. I forgot all about the fake one within a few months of arriving here.
Denied by her father. Denied by her mother. Everything she was.
She heard the sound of something that had sustained her all this time crumbling to pieces.
"I'm... th-that is, I, I'm..."
She swallowed hard and asked herself the question.
Who am I?
Reina shot up from her seat. Leaving the two staring at her in surprise behind, she backed away from them with stumbling steps.
"Miss, are you all right?"
Her mother approached with a worried expression.
Reina tried to shake off her hand, but there was no strength left in her body.
Just then, a clamor erupted as children flooded into the garden.
"Teacher, break time's over!"
"Let's have class!"
The noise jolted Reina back to her senses in an instant.
She fled the scene as if escaping, leaving her mother's voice calling after her behind.
And she ran.
With no destination at all.
***
Rumi and Oberon were not siblings by blood. Such a concept didn't even exist in fairy society to begin with. When Oberon was young, Rumi had rescued him from a crisis while he was wandering the human world, and they had formed their bond from there.
Over ten years had passed since the two had last met. Not a long span for a fairy, but Rumi had grown accustomed to human time. It felt like she hadn't seen him in ages.
Oberon really had changed significantly since she'd last seen him. He was taller, broader, and had even grown a cocky-looking beard.
Rumi frowned as she watched him light a cigar.
"That'll rot your lungs."
"Worth it."
He took a drag and exhaled a long plume of smoke.
"Still full of yourself, I see. Suited to the troupe leader life?"
"What do I even do? Lord Puck handles everything anyway. What about you, sister? What brings you all the way here?"
Rumi gave him a brief summary of what had happened to them.
"Hmm. All this for a large-scale teleportation that big? Feels like there's more to it..."
"I don't know. We probably just got lucky with the timing."
Oberon plucked the cigar from between his fingers.
"So that Scarecrow's with you too, then? Fine. I'll keep your secret. But about that white-haired girl among the Five Acrobats, the one who uses illusions. Maya, was it? She's your friends' daughter, right?"
Oberon had once briefly taken refuge with the Silver Screen Circus. He remembered the two humans who had been with Rumi.
One was a delicate-featured painter, the other a blunt, cold-auraed mage.
"That's right."
"Ha. Looks-wise she takes after her father, but the overall feel is her mother, isn't it? What's her personality like?"
"A carbon copy of her mom."
Sitting face to face and talking about old times like this made Rumi suddenly aware of her age. Having spent the last few days in her fairy form and growing used to being called "big sister," she had genuinely fallen under the illusion that she was young.
Of course, by fairy standards she was indeed on the younger side, but "Eunmak Arno" was firmly at an age that looked toward old age in human society.
Tomorrow this Mask Play would end. She needed to get her mind right now so she wouldn't make any mistakes when she returned.
"Anyway, who is this Scarecrow? A lover?"
"L-Lover?! N-No, he is not!"
She sprang up and practically shouted it.
"Getting angry makes me think it's true."
"Quit taking baseless jabs, will you?"
"The way you look at that man, sister, it's pure honey dripping. Want me to tell you how many times you grabbed his hand in barely an hour?"
"You little—!"
A white dragon illusion materialized above Rumi's head and lunged at Oberon. He conjured a black dragon illusion to counter it. The two dragons bit and clawed at each other, rolling across the floor.
The pair continued their conversation naturally while maintaining the illusions.
"Tch. The little snot-nosed brat grew up and now he teases his big sister."
"Tease? I'm saying this out of concern for you. What kind of fairy hides inside an illusion for twenty years? You're not some shut-in. Honestly, it was nice seeing you get angry and laugh in your fairy form for the first time in forever."
He chuckled around his cigar, and Rumi shuddered at the sight.
"How did the little brat get so disgustingly old?"
"Time, they call it."
At that moment, a piercing shriek rang out. It came from the illusionary dragons. The white dragon had mounted the black dragon, slashing wildly with its claws, and the black dragon hunched over, whimpering piteously.
"I've lost."
"Hmph. Your illusions haven't improved as much as your tongue."
"Tch. How many people in the world can match you in illusions, sister?"
Oberon waved a hand and dismissed the black dragon. Rumi shrank the white dragon illusion down onto her lap and scratched its neck in commendation for its victory.
Having exhausted their idle chatter, the two now moved on to the subject of the Sleeping Chaos.
"About the Kirkeus problem. What about making a whole lot more Trill? The Apostles said it, right? That it's like a kind of magnifying lens for observing the world. So just make enough to match the number of eyes."
Oberon shook his head.
"There are reasons we can't do that—both moral and physical."
"Moral reasons?"
"Why do you think Trill got nicknamed the Eye of Kirkeus?"
Rumi considered it for a moment, then her expression shifted rapidly.
"Eyes... wait... You don't mean...?"
Oberon nodded, confirming her suspicion.
"That's right. The core material of a Trill is a human eyeball. Specifically, one from a person born with the Eye of Kirkeus."
Rumi's face drained of color.
"Then the Trill they said was made recently...?"
"Probably, yes."
Rumi wore a complicated expression for a moment before letting out a long breath.
"So however much they pretend to be jovial, a Demon God is still a Demon God. Vicious. And the physical reason you can't make more Trill is that you can't get more Eyes of Kirkeus, right?"
"That's right."
Rumi recalled what the Apostle had said.
It had said that the number of people born with the Eye of Kirkeus had been plummeting for over a decade.
A sudden, horrifying thought struck her.
"Could someone have made a whole lot of Trill at once?"
"The Apostles would've known about that."
"Then maybe an Eye of Kirkeus club went on a group trip and got into an accident."
Oberon snorted at Rumi's joke and shook his head.
"Even if something like that really happened, it wouldn't explain this. When someone with the Eye of Kirkeus dies, the authority automatically transfers to the next person to be born. To sever that cycle of circulation? That's proof that powerful mado was involved."
"Well, it's not like the Voodoo Cult and other bastards are hard to find in this world."
"Exactly. So even if we try to protect them from our side... there's no method. Because you can't distinguish an Eye of Kirkeus just by looking at them."
"Then how do the hunters do it?"
"I don't know. All I know is that people with the Eye of Kirkeus are born with one distinguishing trait."
"What's that?"
Oberon tossed his half-smoked cigar into the ashtray and asked in return.
"What do you think the most important characteristic of a Trill is?"
"Hmm. That it turns red when it sees an entertaining performance? That's how it was in the first Grand Prix—they competed over who could make the jewel redder."
"Right. You could also summarize it this way: it's capable of measuring a performance's 'relative score.'"
"Huh?"
At the word "score," a voice suddenly echoed through Rumi's mind. It belonged to a bright teenage girl. The moment she recalled the name, Oberon added his explanation.
"A person born with the Eye of Kirkeus literally acts as a proxy for the Eye. The moment they watch a performance, they can supposedly feel it: 'This is worth so many points.'"