The Saintess Takes a Walk
"Incredible. Healing magic—of all things!"
If that didn't make her a saintess, nothing would.
The smack of a broad palm against a back rang down the street. The sun had sunk to the horizon, and orange light lay over the road and the people moving through it.
"That hurts."
"Haha! Does it, now?"
The man, Lee Hanguk, stopped the hand that had been thumping Eila's back.
"How am I supposed to repay a kindness like this..."
He looked around. It was an ordinary day, no different from any other—and yet, inside that ordinary day, people who might never have come back had returned.
A hunter never knew when death would come. Torn apart by a monster. In a quarrel with another hunter. Swept up in a dungeon collapse. Or, once the heart had been worn down to nothing, by a choice made in a single moment. A trade with every variety of death laid out and waiting: that was what it meant to be a hunter.
The death rate had fallen a great deal since the early days, and still the mortality of the profession remained high. Today alone had been one tightrope walk after another. A dungeon whose danger didn't match the report. Monsters bursting out without warning. Without someone's help, six of them might well have died before the day was out.
Plenty of things didn't add up. Even so, people had lived because of her.
Healing magic.
Of every attribute of magic, it was said to be the rarest. The claim that a single healing mage could double a party's chance of coming home alive was no empty boast. Broken bones had knit. Torn flesh had closed. Bodies rotting under poison had returned to what they were.
If that wasn't a miracle, what else could you call it? And if the woman who had worked that miracle wasn't a saintess, what else was she? Among those who had received Eila's help today, at least, not one soul would quibble at her calling herself a saintess.
"Just say the word. I may not look it, but I'm a fairly senior hunter. Whatever you want, I can see to it, more or less."
Having witnessed a treatment like a miracle, and having heard Eila's age, Lee Hanguk had begun to treat her with an easy familiarity, the way one might a young niece.
"No. As I said before, I only did what needed to be done."
"You don't have to turn me down like that! I've piled up a fortune with no one to leave it to, and my connections run pretty wide. You saved people's lives. A reward of that size would still come cheap."
Lee Hanguk meant every word. He was a veteran hunter with six years in the field. An aging body and old injuries had left his rank stalled at A, but in experience and knowledge he stood level with the S-ranks. Precisely because he was that man, he understood to the marrow how beautiful a thing it was—how sacred—to save another person's life. Those who had already slipped through his own hands numbered well into the hundreds.
If only I'd been a little stronger then—
If only I'd taken another road—
The tower those if-onlys had raised was the pillar that held him up. A person who saved lives deserved a reward to match.
"I'm truly all right. When one person saves another, are a reason and a reward really necessary?"
Eila meant it, too. Saving people—an obvious thing to say, and an obvious truth. The life the Hero had given back to her, used for the Hero's homeland: that was only right. She had merely paid a debt. And who ever handed out a prize for paying one's debts properly?
Sparks leapt in the space between their eyes. Lee Hanguk was the first to give in.
"Well. If that's how you feel, there's nothing I can do."
"Thank you."
"Still, if you ever really need help, say so. I can lend a hand. And if you don't mind, I could give you my number."
Helping was helping, of course. But a healer this rare—letting a catch that big slip away would sting a little, wouldn't it? It was with that thought that he spoke to her.
"...A number?"
"Hm?"
"What is a number?"
Some joke. Were the kids these days really going around cracking gags like that? He was about to think so—except Eila's face was completely sincere. Bewildered, Lee Hanguk drew a phone from his pocket.
"A number, that's—this cell ph—"
"Ah! I know that one. A sma...rtphone. A smartphone, yes?"
"...Yeah. That's right."
What? She does know.
"I'm sorry. I don't have a smartphone, so I don't have a number."
"Ah. That so?"
A strange feeling came over him. A peculiar feeling he couldn't pin down in a single word.
"Um..."
"Hm? What is it?"
"If you use that thing—a smartphone—can you find a person with it?"
"...Why? Is there someone you're looking for?"
"Yes."
Eila nodded. Lee Hanguk's eyes narrowed.
Looking for a person. He'd heard of that sort of thing. Hunters attached to the government or to corporations, sent to run down hunters who had fled. Is this girl one of them?
The thought lasted only a moment. Then Lee Hanguk let out a short, incredulous laugh. This was a child who had saved people without asking a thing in return. Then he ought to trust her at least once, shouldn't he? If she had truly come down here on some secret assignment, she wouldn't have made such a spectacle of healing everyone.
"I'll help you. My connections run wide, if I do say so myself. Tell me everything you know about the person you're looking for."
Tell me everything you know. Hearing that, Eila fell into thought. She knew a great deal about the Hero. She could have talked until dawn. But she could hardly go blurting out what had happened on the other side, and so she swallowed the words.
"His name is... Kim Jiwoo. He's a man."
"Do you happen to know his age?"
His age. He had been summoned as the Hero ten years ago, and he had been seventeen then... No. That wasn't right. At that time, the Hero hadn't been in the other world. So should she answer with the age he was when he was summoned?
"Seventeen... I think."
"Is that so?"
"Ah! The Republic of Korea, Seoul! That's his hometown!"
He had always referred to it simply as home, so it took her a moment to drag the name back up. The "Republic of Korea" in front was probably the country, and "Seoul" the name of the city. At her words, Lee Hanguk's expression changed.
"Seoul?"
"Yes. The Republic of Korea, Seoul. He definitely said it that way."
"Why would you look for someone from Seoul out here...?"
"Pardon?"
"This is Jeju Island."
"Jeju... Island?"
"Right. Jeju Island."
"And where, exactly, is Jeju Island?"
"All right. Go straight that way and you'll hit the mainland. Keep heading up from there, and you'll come to Seoul."
"Hmm..."
Beyond the iron railing, a blue sea heaved and rolled. Eila let out a sigh.
An island. So all of that water had been the sea.
"What ways are there to get to Seoul?"
"Well, you'd take a ship, or a plane. Both of them cost a fair bit, though."
"...Money."
The man was right. Even something as simple as a carriage cost money to ride. How much, then, for a ship that crossed the sea, or for a plane? One thing was certain: it was more than she could pay as she stood now.
"...If I walk straight that way, Seoul will be there. Is that right?"
"Well... yes? Not right away, mind you."
"Then that's enough. Thank you. May the Lord's blessing go with you."
"Huh? H-hey...?"
Eila sprang up and cleared the railing. The motion was so natural that Lee Hanguk missed his chance to stop her. Whether he meant to or not, she was already walking, unhurried, toward the sea.
"Hey! You're not thinking of swimming, are you?!"
His voice turned rough. He had to stop her. Since the gates had appeared, the sea was no longer on humanity's side. Gates born in the deep, and the monsters that issued from them, had shrunk mankind's territorial waters with brutal speed. It was a world where a single ship couldn't move unless three warships traveled lashed alongside it. Swimming alone in a sea like that? It was suicide.
"No. I can't swim."
The answer that came back was absurd. She can't swim—so why is she walking toward the sea?
Eila's footsteps didn't falter. Before long she stood at the end of the breakwater. One more step, and the water would close over her.
"Hey! Hey! You little—"
She's out of her mind.
Eila was tapping the ground with her toes. Lee Hanguk vaulted the railing at once, and in the very instant he meant to sprint after her—
"Hey!!"
Eila's body vanished before his eyes. She had gone into the sea. The drop from the breakwater to the surface was some three meters. Lee Hanguk bent and stared down at the water.
"Is something the matter?"
"...Huh?"
Eila was standing there, perfectly unharmed.
Standing?
"Wh—what?"
"Has something happened?"
She was standing. On the water. Perfectly fine. On two feet. He rubbed his eyes, and it was the same. Eila stood planted upon the water, and his thoughts simply stopped.
"...? I'll be going, then. Thank you."
Splash. Splash.
Eila began to walk across the sea. It looked natural—so natural that anyone who didn't understand what they were seeing might have thought she was merely stepping out for a stroll.
Splash. Splash.
Eila walked. Her destination was Seoul, the Hero's hometown. If she found word of him, she would find someone, whether friend or family. She would tell that person the Hero's story, place the Holy Sword and the pendant in their hands, and then kill every last monster. Surely then the Hero would be glad.
Her fingers brushed the pendant. A blue gem, marked with a black spot. It seemed to mean something, but she couldn't quite remember what. That made her sad—the knowledge that, from here on, all that remained was the forgetting of memories like these.
Splash. Splash.
Before she knew it, the shore had fallen a long way behind. Eila kept walking.
Her destination was Seoul. The Hero's hometown.