The Forgotten One (6)
In the Outer Land, there exists a phenomenon known as Erosion.
It appears in those who live beyond the span of life the world has allotted to humankind—beings the natural order regards as little more than errors. They possess bodies that can endure eternity, yet lack minds able to withstand it. That is how the phenomenon takes hold.
Traveling the Outer Land, Najin had seen many who suffered under Erosion. Among them were those who had eroded completely, becoming undead—or fallen stars.
Schlein. Kruenbel. Alderan…
Compared to them, something about the Blue Lance had never quite added up.
Why has the Blue Lance never eroded?
Erosion comes when one loses memory, loses one’s star, or is denied one’s convictions and achievements until one can no longer believe in oneself. By that logic, the Blue Lance should have become an undead long ago.
A being who lost every memory each day.
What creature could be more vulnerable to Erosion than that?
And yet for more than three hundred years, the Blue Lance had not eroded. He lost his memories, but he kept his mind. So Najin had assumed he possessed some means of evading Erosion, the way Gerd, Yuel, or the Lighthouse Keeper did.
That was what I thought.
Najin looked at what stood before him.
There was the Blue Lance, staring back with empty eyes. Cracks—the marks of Erosion—had even begun to show on his body.
"Who are you?"
The Blue Lance, who had forgotten his convictions and even how to read.
Why was Erosion appearing only now? And so suddenly? Najin frowned and pressed hard between his brows.
He thought he knew the reason.
This was not the first time. He had faced the same situation with the Helmet Knight. That man, too, had been whole until a certain moment, then eroded with startling speed—and the two cases shared a common thread.
Najin had learned something from them.
And their lingering regrets had begun to show signs of resolution.
Exactly how that hastened Erosion, Najin could not say. He only guessed that, much as parents who have finished raising their children sometimes age all at once, the act of passing on what one holds—and thereby settling one’s regrets—must somehow affect it.
Was I wrong? Did I choose the wrong way?
Najin was shaken. The approach he had believed correct might have been a mistake after all.
That isn’t for you to decide.
Merlin, who had kept silent, spoke at last.
Shouldn’t you ask the man himself?
But with the Blue Lance like that…
Have you forgotten? You’ve got a star that’s perfect for moments like this.
Ah— Najin let out a breath.
Only then did he recall the piece of knowledge he had set aside. He closed his eyes and focused. High above, his fifth star answered its master’s will.
The Star of Funeral Rites.
Najin unclenched the fist that held it. As the starlight washed over him, light returned to the Blue Lance’s vacant eyes. He clutched his temple with a groan, as if the world were spinning, and after a moment looked at Najin with a furrowed brow.
"What is this… You—no. Who are you, sir?"
The Blue Lance had begun using formal speech again.
Najin exhaled in relief, though he knew full well that the Star of Funeral Rites could only slow Erosion or restore him for a while. It could never do so forever.
Najin felt it in his bones.
The moment of choice had arrived.
"First," Najin said, pointing the flustered Blue Lance toward the diary, "read that journal. Then we’ll talk again."
The Blue Lance nodded and turned the hourglass over. Sand was already leaking from the cracked glass.
"I am Najin. Free Knight Najin."
An introduction for the who-knew-how-many-th time.
"And this is a letter from yesterday’s you."
A letter sent from yesterday to today.
Once he had delivered everything that needed delivering and spoken with the Blue Lance for a while, Najin fell silent. Ordinarily he would have begun swinging a spear from this point on, preparing for tomorrow—but he could not do that now.
After a long silence, Najin opened his mouth.
"Blue Lance."
"Yes, Najin."
"I am learning the spear from you."
"I know. It’s written in the diary, and it was among the things yesterday’s me asked you to pass on, wasn’t it?"
"…Does that make you proud?"
"What a strange question. I lose my memories every day. The fact that I can leave something behind—that my life does not end with today but continues into tomorrow—how could I not be proud of that? I am grateful to you."
Saying so, the Blue Lance smiled.
Najin could not smile back.
How should he put it? His expression stayed stiff, unable to find an easy way forward. Seeing that face, the Blue Lance’s smile softened.
"Najin."
It was a gentle smile, a gentle voice—the voice of an adult soothing a child.
"As I said, I am grateful to you. I know you have spent a great deal of time on my behalf, that you have worked hard. I do not take that lightly. So it is all right."
"…"
"Speak freely. I will not resent you for anything."
After a moment’s hesitation, Najin spoke.
"The act of learning the spear from you—and the whole chain of carrying yesterday’s words to today’s you—is hastening your Erosion."
"What is Erosion?"
"It is losing even your foundation, until body and soul crumble and you become a monster."
The Blue Lance stroked his chin and nodded.
"Ah. Like when I looked down on you, before the starlight touched me?"
"…If it goes further than that, you’ll attack me to take the star I hold. You’ll become a beast that hungers only for stars."
"Mm. I definitely don’t care for that."
The Blue Lance grimaced as if disgusted. But that was as far as it went. There was no fear in him, no revulsion. In a voice no different from usual, he asked:
"So how much time do I have left?"
"If we keep repeating the same things, about three days, I think. That’s the limit."
"Three days. Three days, is it."
He murmured it, then grinned.
"That’s enough. With that much."
"…Enough?"
"Yes. Enough. And Najin? You needn’t worry about me. You needn’t doubt yourself even more—wondering if your method was wrong."
He rose with his spear in hand.
"If the diary is accurate, and if what you say is true, I have spent no less than three hundred years in this desert. Losing my memories every single day, swinging a spear whose meaning I no longer knew, dying one day and living the next."
In truth— the Blue Lance gave a bitter smile.
"I don’t know if you can even call that ‘living.’ I can’t say how my past self would have put it."
He opened the diary wide before Najin—the pages he had written since meeting him.
"After meeting you, it seems I began to feel that I was ‘alive.’ The sentences changed. No longer just strings of objective facts—I started writing what I myself thought."
The handwriting was not neat. The pages were full of words rewritten again and again, struck through with double lines, then written anew. Even without reading the content, one could feel the vitality in it.
"I am alive. I feel that I am alive. I don’t fully understand this Erosion of yours, but doesn’t it come only to those who are living? The way people grow old and die."
"That’s…"
"It even makes sense that Erosion, which never came for three hundred years, arrives at this very moment."
In that case, the Blue Lance said,
"I mean to take this Erosion as proof that I am alive. Not so bad. Yes—not bad at all."
And with that he laughed—a laugh so clear and unburdened that Najin, struck speechless by a man who welcomed the Erosion coming for him, could only let out a short, incredulous huff of laughter himself.
"Blue Lance."
Najin rose to his feet.
When the man himself spoke like that, he could not remain sitting. Najin did what he had to do, and what he could do.
"You have two paths before you."
"Yes. What are they?"
"One is that I leave you as you are. Then you would erode no further. The same daily life you have repeated for three hundred years would simply continue."
"And the other path?"
"That I master your spear completely, and resolve your lingering regrets."
"If my regrets are resolved, what becomes of me?"
"You will die. Probably."
The Blue Lance looked straight at Najin.
"May I ask one thing, Najin?"
"Anything."
"Once you have learned the spear from me, where will you go? What will you accomplish? What is your goal?"
To that question, Najin answered.
He spoke of where he had begun, and of the place he had set as his aim. Listening to the story that went on for some time, the Blue Lance nodded with a satisfied smile.
"Then that settles it."
"Settles what?"
"It means I am content. Though I cannot be certain. My past self, without a doubt…"
The Blue Lance opened the diary in his hands. He seemed to be searching for a particular passage; his fingers stopped as he turned the pages. Then he gave a short, light laugh and closed the book.
"I am certain."
And he said,
"I have lived to become someone’s soil. And now that I can begin to imagine how beautiful the flower that blooms from me might be… I think this:"
In a desert that leaves nothing behind—
In the heart of a desert where not a single blade of grass will grow, the Blue Lance had seen a flower bloom. Because he had seen it, he could speak.
"It was worth it."
The Blue Lance chose what he would leave behind.
"In my heart I want to say I choose the second path… but this does not feel like something I alone can decide. And I have my doubts as well."
"Doubts about what?"
"I resented my past self. I said I did not, but in truth I did. I resented the self who threw himself away, who discarded his memories. But I do not want to do that at the end."
Then— when Najin asked, the Blue Lance answered.
"Ask the same question of tomorrow’s me—of the me who will know nothing. This is the last letter I leave."
Sand ran from the cracked hourglass. The grains that spilled returned to the desert. As the sand that had been trapped in the glass for three hundred years went back to the dunes, night came to the desert, and then morning came again.
Dawn broke. The first light of day brightened the sky.
As a soft haze settled over the desert and the grains of sand caught the sunlight, glowing faintly like starlight, he opened his eyes. Those eyes were empty. Remembering nothing, he looked at what stood before him.
A young man sat there.
The man asked the youth, "Who are you?" The youth answered—but not the question the man had asked.
"You lose your memories every day. You remember nothing. You have been doing so for three hundred years."
The youth explained.
The situation the man was in, and the life he had repeated. The youth did not speak at length. Having settled on only the necessary information, he put a question to the man.
"You have two paths before you."
Two paths. Two ways.
After the youth had described each, the man asked once more.
"Who are you?"
"Najin. Free Knight Najin."
"I see. Najin."
After a brief pause, he spoke.
"I don’t know how my past self would have thought. I do not know myself. But one thing I can tell is this."
Then he smiled.
"I doubt that eternal life holds any value. That is not living even if you live. It is dying. If so, then even for a single day—I want to live."
Life.
"You said you were my disciple?"
"I have learned the spear from you."
"Then make me one promise."
"What is it?"
"That you will use me as a foothold to climb higher."
At that answer, Najin could not help but laugh.
"Why do you laugh?"
"It would be faster to ask yourself that."
Najin took hold of the Star of Funeral Rites. Recalling his own convictions, the Blue Lance could not help but understand why Najin had laughed. After reading the diary and hearing all that had passed, the Blue Lance laughed aloud.
"Even when I lose my memories completely—even when I forget my convictions—I think the same thing, do I?"
"You really are a consistent man."
"You have every right to laugh. Yes—then, since we don’t have much time, let’s begin at once."
"Begin what?"
"What else?"
The man who had chosen to be the Blue Lance took up his spear.
"The day’s work. One cannot skip the day’s work."
In the middle of the desert, the Blue Lance swung his spear. Even when the wind rose and stirred the sand, the traces of his swings did not vanish. The footprints he pressed into the desert did not vanish either.
Because someone followed after him.
Najin swung his spear in the Blue Lance’s wake. He walked in the steps of the man who went ahead. And so, as the sun was setting—
Thud.
Najin and the Blue Lance stood in the same place.
"Najin."
The Blue Lance offered what would be his last greeting.
"I will see you tomorrow."