Ep.3 - Witch City Laptel (1)
Ep.3 - Witch City Laptel (1)
Their flight through the moonlit sky continued for quite some time.
In the cold upper air, where looking down felt as though you might shatter to pieces, where you could almost touch the moon, Delin squeezed his eyes shut and tried to endure as best he could.
"Cold?"
Perhaps she had noticed Delin's shivering.
The woman asked Delin, who was clinging to her back, in a voice that was quite gentle.
"Ah, n-no..."
"Why do you lie and try to tough it out? I know you're cold."
She soon unfurled her left hand elegantly. From that smooth gesture, a blue energy began to ripple forth.
"Whoa..."
"Your reactions are cute."
Soon the blue energy enveloped Delin's body, and the warmth radiating from the Milky Way-like sparkles gradually heated the air around them.
The chill vanished and only the blue moonlight remained, lingering and winding around Delin.
'Beautiful...'
"We're almost there, so don't worry. You've been through some rough times, it seems, but the place we're going now will be filled with nothing but joy, you know?"
Delin felt grateful toward this kind mage...?—who had helped him.
Without her aid, he might have met a terrible end before daybreak...
But not being a complete idiot, Delin still didn't let his guard down. He remembered, every single one without exception, all the humiliations he had suffered at the hands of women so far.
'This woman could also suddenly turn on me while pretending to be nice. I have to be careful.'
For Delin, who had never imagined that Neva—whom he thought had saved him—could become such a terrifying being, not easing his wariness toward this unfamiliar woman was entirely natural and justified.
But the blue magic she cast and her smooth back were so, so warm...
'...Still, it's warm for now.'
It allowed Delin to relax his tension a little and thaw his body.
"We're here. Can you see it?"
Only after flying for quite a while longer did the woman on the broom announce they had reached their destination.
Listening to her, Delin looked ahead and faced the massive silhouette of something floating in the sky...!
"Huh-huhk..."
That enormous [island]-like thing was floating in midair, sending out strange lights!
'S-so this really is a fantasy world...'
Looking at that floating island, the woman called it a Sky Island, and added that many, many people lived there, all of them wielding magic just like her.
Questions swirled in Delin's head, like whether the Sword Aura that Neva had unleashed or Philmark's poisons were classified as something other than magic, but first, he silently walked the streets alongside the woman.
Buildings that looked like they were built of purple wood, with strange orange lanterns clustered thickly around them...
Delin etched them into his memory—sights you'd only see at a Halloween event.
'Halloween?'
Speaking of Halloween, this woman currently holding him—rather than a mage...
A witch?
That was the impression.
Still, she didn't seem like a bad person...
But.
Strange gazes kept prickling at him from the surroundings, making him afraid to keep following.
Up at that window, inside that alleyway—women who seemed to be just walking past looked at him and whispered among themselves.
Women wearing hats with large brims and purple or blue dresses...? Or robes.
"E-excuse me. I think people keep staring at me."
"Staring? Who?"
"Pardon...? No, look, up at that window—... huh?"
The window he pointed at was shut, as if it had never been open,
"No, just now behind us, too... eh...?"
The women who seemed to have been whispering behind them had also vanished, as if they had never been there.
As if only the two of them had been on this street from the very start.
"What's wrong? You must be feeling quite unwell. Seeing things that aren't there. Let's go get some good rest."
The woman just gave a gentle smile and didn't react in any particular way.
But Delin, unable to shake the sudden unease and strange sense of wrongness, struggled in her arms.
No.
Wait, fuck, why am I in this woman's arms?
What the hell!
"Where... where are you going! I'll be going now. Thank you for the ride...! Please let me down now. Since when...!"
"Oh my? You're just going to leave?"
"Y-yes... anyway, I'm really grateful. Please let me down..!"
"I can't let you do that. When you receive help, it's common courtesy to at least share a meal."
"No, no! I'll just go..! Sorry! Just the way out, quickly...!"
"To where?"
"Huh?"
"To where?"
"To where..?"
"Yes. To where."
"Ah...? Uh... well, that is..."
At some point, as if a fog had rolled in, Delin's mind became hazy. He stared blankly at his own hands, fumbling through his thoughts.
Huh? Where was I trying to go?
"Oh dear. Did you forget again? I said let's go have a meal together, noona and you."
"Ah... th-that's not it..."
"Huh? You said you were hungry."
"I did..?"
"Of course. Can't you remember what we just talked about? Since you were already receiving [help], you asked if you could have some [food] too. That cheeky attitude was so cute that I decided to treat you to a meal."
"S-sorry. My memory isn't very good..."
"That's fine. That's part of your charm too. Now, let's go again."
The woman began to walk lightly again. Delin, held in her arms and just blinking his eyes repeatedly, could only be described as a newborn baby.
"The pumpkins this time are such good quality—once you taste one you might keep thinking about it. Whenever that happens, come find noona's house. Well... you'll always be at my house anyway."
"Pumpkin..? Uh..."
"When I'm persuading you like this, don't hesitate, just answer, [Yes. I understand.]. Got it?"
"Yes. I understand.."
"That's right. Good."
"Eonni! You lured him in well!"
"Of course. He's a toy our cute little ones will like."
"Eh?"
Before he knew it, a new woman with an unfamiliar face was grinning brightly beside Delin. The woman who had led him and the woman who had suddenly appeared exchanged radiant smiles and greeted each other.
"Huh? Since when..."
"What is?"
"Huh?"
"What is!"
"Uh..."
"We were walking together like this from the start!"
We were..?
I guess we were.
Seeing that brazen attitude, we definitely must have been. I must be remembering it wrong.
"What's your name?"
"Uh... my real name? Or..."
"What do you mean, your real name!"
"Real name, he says~ did you have a fake one too?"
"What! I could have an alias."
"So, your name?"
He blinked again, and this time, a multitude of women were walking along, completely surrounding him.
But Delin's mind couldn't keep up with the situation. His mind, which was never particularly sharp to begin with, had now been rendered even duller and more sluggish—like being drunk.
"I said, what's your name!"
"Oo-wah... eonni. There are so many bruise marks on his nape!"
"Not just there, there's seriously a lot on his stomach and back too?"
"W-wait a minute. You're touching me too much..."
"Huh? Touching you too much?"
"Touching you is a good thing!"
"You should be thanking us, really."
"He's got no manners~"
Ah...?
I was told not to live without manners...
"Th-thank you..."
Who said that?
Mom...? Dad?
No? A friend?
A teacher?
"Hnng...! Wait a min... ute... that place is too..."
The women's fingers, brimming with curiosity, burrowed without hesitation inside Delin's clothes and felt his bare skin without restraint.
"Now, now, dears. Don't do that here, everyone go back to your houses. He's a precious boy to be used as teaching material starting from tomorrow's class, so it wouldn't do to use him without proper learning first, right?"
"Ah, eonni!"
"You're just saying that because you want to use him all by yourself, right?"
"I want to sleep with him tonight too!"
"Shh. Everyone needs to listen to eonni."
The woman brought her slender index finger to her moist lips, and soon the other women shut their chattering mouths.
The disappointment was stark on their faces. The body of a man they were encountering for the first time was far too fascinating to just let him go like this.
But they did not defy the woman they called [eonni]. They only swallowed their regret, cast sticky, honey-dripping glances over Delin, and no longer laid a hand on his body.
"Yes. Good girls, all of you... See you in class tomorrow."
With those words, the women who had surrounded him vanished without a trace, as if they had never existed from the beginning.
"Wha-what the...!"
"What's wrong now?"
"Everyone suddenly disa—...!"
"Hm?"
"Eh...?"
"What could you be talking about? We're on our way to eat pumpkin porridge."
"Pumpkin porridge...?"
"Yes. Sweet pumpkin porridge. I mean the smooth pumpkin porridge that warms your chilled body."
"Ah... that's right..."
"Now, let's go again."
And so, Delin, held in the woman's arms, passed beneath the orange lights and headed for her house.
He didn't know where it was, but surely it would be a warm and sweet place.
Ah. The warm and sweet thing was the pumpkin porridge.
Yeah... pumpkin porridge...
"Sweet and warm pumpkin porridge is waiting for you. Go, eat well, and sleep soundly."
"Yes..."
But, but...
I feel like I'm forgetting something...
Why am I eating pumpkin porridge here...
...That's right. Because it's sweet and warm.
I'm looking forward to it. I think it'll taste good..
A single man entered the witch city of Raftel.
Normally, Raftel was a men-forbidden zone that did not allow men in, as they were considered beneath dignity (or disruptive to other witches' training and discipline).
But very occasionally, they would capture a man to use as teaching material for biology and mana circulation classes.
What happened to the captured men was not known to the outside world.
Not only was it difficult to obtain information due to the witches' customs of avoiding outside interaction, but the men taken to that high, high Sky Island never returned home.