The Outsider
"The secret got out? What do you mean?"
I was completely thrown. Hadn't we agreed to keep my identity a secret from the village? And yet this reaction... it felt like they'd known exactly who I was for a long time already.
While I stood there in a daze, the villagers drifted over one by one and piled on.
"We all figured it out ages ago."
"Well, of course we did. Evelyn's been acting real strange these past few days."
"Buying ingredients and spices she never used to touch. Hauling off piles of lumber and tools without a word about what they were for..."
"And whenever anybody asked, she'd just mumble something and dodge the question."
Another round of laughter and chatter followed.
...I was a lot more obvious than I thought.
I quietly turned to look at Evelyn. She scratched her cheek as if embarrassed and avoided my eyes. In fairness, I couldn't blame her alone. The ingredients, the lumber, the tools—most of it had been because of me.
Well. So this was how it turned out.
"Don't just stand there wearing out your legs. Come sit down!"
"Come on, hurry!"
"Ah—wait a second...!"
And so, once again, I was half shoved into the seat they'd prepared for me. Somewhere in the process of being herded over, the hood of my robe had long since slipped off. My bare face, which I'd been hiding, was now on full display—and far from being shocked, the villagers just cheered at the sight of it. Said I looked just like they remembered. Said I was cute, of course. Nonsense like that.
I get that they're glad to see me, but these people have absolutely no delicacy!
Did they not realize this much attention could actually kill someone as introverted as I was? Every instinct I had screamed at me to bolt for home that very second, but my body had already locked up under all those eyes, and I couldn't do a thing.
Helpless, I shot Evelyn a pleading look, and she came over and sat down beside me.
No. I didn't ask you to sit next to me. I asked you to take me home.
But the mood had already made leaving difficult, and I gave up entirely, dropping my gaze to the table.
"Don't be so stiff. Everyone here came to welcome you."
A welcome party. For me.
Who asked for that? I never wanted anything like a company dinner! Well... at least it didn't look like I was about to be burned at the stake, so maybe I ought to count that as a win.
Just then a man whose face had gone bright red—already several drinks deep, by the look of him—laughed loudly and called out.
"Hey! Our guest of honor's here, so hurry up and bring that out!"
That? Bring what out now?
A moment later, when I saw what landed on the table, I couldn't hide my shock. Because the thing they meant was none other than pizza.
Pizza! The very same pizza I'd tried to make at the mansion and failed at completely. Good lord. I'd never imagined I'd see a proper pizza in a place like this—and an enormous one, at that, looking bigger than I was. Huge as it was, the dough looked properly fluffy. It wasn't even in the same category as the inedible disaster I'd produced.
"How on earth did you...?"
I turned to Evelyn in disbelief, and she gave me an awkward smile, scratching her cheek.
"Well... the truth is, I told Hannah your recipe once. She said she thought she could make it. So we've been experimenting a bit since then."
No way. They whipped this up just from my description?
While I sat there overwhelmed, the villagers laughed and urged me to try it.
"Go on, eat! Everyone worked themselves half to death making that!"
"But don't you go saying it's so good you eat the whole thing yourself. We've been waiting for a taste too!"
They didn't have to tell me. I couldn't finish it anyway. And so I tasted the welcome gift the villagers had made for me—this world's pizza.
After the welcome party at the inn was over, I walked through the dark forest, guided by the light of the Dreadfire and by Evelyn.
"So? Glad you came to the festival, right?"
"Yes. I suppose I am."
The festival really had been more fun than I'd expected. And yet the circus I'd been looking forward to most had turned out to be a trap. They say the world never goes the way you think it will, but I'd never imagined it would be a spirit show. Still, I'd enjoyed myself regardless. And I'd come away with something, too.
I sighed, looking down at the souvenirs filling both my arms. Those strange hospitality games I'd seen at the prize tent... looking back, everyone had simply wanted to give me something. They'd been worried that handing things over outright would make me uncomfortable, or so they said. No wonder the games had been rigged so obviously in my favor.
...The problem was that even then, I hadn't managed to win a single thing.
Which was why, in the end, they'd simply pressed the prizes into my arms out in the open. What I'd received was all over the place—ordinary snacks, ornaments, toys, tableware, cooking tools, clothes, everyday necessities. All of it things I'd needed, whether I'd realized it or not. On top of that, Evelyn said a real carpenter would come later to properly fix the parts she'd only patched for the time being.
Everything was going remarkably well for me. And yet, on the other hand, everyone being this kind left me with a strange feeling. It was too much to write off as villagers who simply liked helping strangers. I'd received far too much.
Do I really deserve any of this?
I'm someone who believes nothing in this world comes free, so I couldn't understand it. I could accept why Evelyn helped me—her own satisfaction, and the debt she felt for attacking me so rashly at the start. But I'd never actually done anything for the villagers. Yes, I'd saved one of their kids. Even so, I couldn't easily grasp why the entire village would welcome me like this. And if I thought about it, the reason that kid had ended up stranded alone in the forest in the first place was probably because I'd been screaming while a wolf chased me.
Besides, Evelyn had once told me there were definitely people who didn't think well of the Elysia family. So what were those people thinking of me now? I couldn't help feeling uneasy, if I thought of this welcome as something that might only be temporary.
"Evelyn, there's something I want to ask."
"Hm? What is it?"
"What did the Elysia family actually do to these people?"
"That's..."
At my question Evelyn fell silent for a moment, as if the words wouldn't come easily. But when she saw how genuinely I wanted to know, she let out a deep sigh, resigned, and went on.
"There was a plague. And making a cure required a great many clinical trials... The Elysia family's methods of recruiting test subjects were a little... forceful."
Not only the already infected, or those on the verge of death. Even people who still had a chance of recovery had been made subjects of the experiments. If anything, you could learn more from patients who still looked relatively healthy than from ones a breath away from dying. Thanks to that, they'd been able to produce a cure quickly. Even so, there were certainly people who had lost family they hadn't needed to lose. And afterward, there really had been disappearances—people who might have been used for black magic. Evelyn had never let any of it show in front of me, but no one could claim there wasn't some knot of old resentment still lodged in their hearts.
Hearing that, I had no choice but to fall silent, at a loss for words. So that was what had happened.
"It all took place after you died. Everyone knows it wasn't your fault."
"I know that, but still..."
Somehow, even though I hadn't done any of it, a corner of my heart felt heavy. For the first time, I felt myself sinking into her story. Until now I'd only ever thought of it as backstory inside a game. Maybe I was starting, little by little, to accept that this world was my new reality.
I was lost in the thought when I realized we'd already arrived at the mansion.
"Here we are. Want me to carry the bags inside?"
"No, you can just leave them. I'll sort through them slowly."
If I put the summons on it, it'd be done in no time anyway. And Evelyn had to be tired from walking me back this late. I felt bad asking for anything more.
"Mm, if that's what you want. Do it however's easiest."
I waved to Evelyn as she headed back, then went into the mansion to call Unit 1 and Unit 3 so they could help with the luggage.
But...
Clack—!
The way Unit 1 came rattling toward me in a panic told me something was wrong.
"What? What happened?"
I didn't think I'd ever seen Unit 1 like this. The same Unit 1 who'd stayed dignified even while a wolf ripped an arm off and chewed on it, this flustered... When I told the skeleton to explain, Unit 1 flailed, desperate to get something across, then jabbed a finger bone at the kitchen over and over in a gesture that clearly meant something's in there.
What could possibly be in the kitchen?
"In the kitchen? Did a rat get in?"
Don't tell me this thing is scared of rats.
Clack—!
At that, Unit 1 drummed on those ribs like a xylophone, lamenting as if about to go mad from frustration. Unable to stand the curiosity any longer, I followed—and what was waiting there was...
"Wh-what is this?!"
A small figure in shabby clothes, collapsed and coughing up blood. Why was there a corpse in my kitchen?! And wait—that cup of black liquid in their hand...
No way!
"You drank my cola...?"
This was bad. I'd never once had to clean up a corpse...
"Cough, cough...!"
"Aaaaah!!"
Wait. This one was still alive?!