Those Who Lost Their Souls (2)
"All set? Shall we go, then?"
"Yes, sister."
Two women of startling beauty stepped out of the building Kant Kepri had gone into, a mountain of bedding stacked in their arms. Laundry in hand, they headed for the stream that ran along the edge of the village.
Hmm. Fairies again, huh?
A glance at their status windows confirmed it. And just like Aila, the first Fairy I had seen here, neither of them belonged to Kant.
Had they served the same Master as Aila, then?
Just what the hell is this place?
That wasn't it either. Aila and these two had all belonged to different Masters. The only thing the three of them shared was that every last one of those Masters was dead.
Did Kant's comrades die? Is that why he's living here with their Fairies?
I tilted my head, watching the two of them wash their laundry by the water. Whatever secret Kant was sitting on, I was growing more curious by the minute.
I lingered around the building until the sky bled red, watching every movement inside.
Seriously, what even is this place? Some kind of shelter?
I watched for just shy of half a day. In that time I counted more than ten Fairies. Only one of them belonged to Kant. The rest had all served other Masters — and every one of those Masters was dead.
Fairies who've lost their Masters... living with smiles on their faces?
Fairies who had lost their Masters, gathered in one place, living on together. To me, this was a profoundly shocking place.
A Master and a Fairy were beings bound by the soul. If either one vanished, the loss that followed was beyond anything words could hold. To a Fairy, a Master was a singular existence — the only one of their kind in all the world. They were the sun. They were the sky. When a Master died, it meant losing the sun. It meant the sky itself coming down.
That was why so many Fairies took their own lives not long after losing their Master. And even those who did not choose death wasted away like uprooted flowers, wilting day after day until they simply dissolved into light and disappeared.
The reverse, however, was a different matter. A Master who lost a Fairy would feel the grief, yes — but they did not lose the will to live. Unlike a Fairy, who existed in total dependence on their Master, a Master was not bound to their Fairy.
Which made this place nothing short of astonishing. Shocking, even.
If my eyes weren't deceiving me — if there was nothing wrong with the status windows — then every one of those Fairies had lost the only Master they would ever have. A situation in which taking their own lives would have been the expected outcome. And yet they hadn't died. They were living on, smiling like people who still had hope, leaning on one another to survive.
How was something like this even possible?
I'd love to walk right in... but that would only make them suspicious.
To learn the truth, I would have to enter the house where Kant was staying. A conversation with him would give me the answers. But I couldn't do that. Kant was the man I had to kill. Fail to kill him, and I would fail the second trial.
She had already invested in me, and I had passed the first trial and proven what I could do, so she wouldn't throw me away on the spot. Her interest, though, would drop off a cliff. And there was still plenty left to squeeze out of her. Having given up my story — the closest thing I had to a real weapon — I had to wring at least twice as much out of Montblanc. Nothing less would do.
...Looks like I'll be sticking around for a while.
I had originally planned to kill Kant and get back to Littleberry as fast as possible. That plan had just changed.
"Hah, I'm beat. Boss! A beer and a whole roast pork, please!"
"Coming~! Just a moment!"
I stepped into the village restaurant and ordered a late dinner. I had skipped every meal watching Kant, and my stomach was screaming.
"You have rooms here too, yes? I'd like to stay for... about three days."
"I'll give you the key when you're finished eating."
I booked a room while I was at it. I could have gone back to Kenveli and taken a proper inn, but I wanted to stay close to Kant, so the village it was.
I waited a short while, and the owner came out of the kitchen with my food.
"Enjoy~"
"Thank you."
I took a swallow of beer and tore into the pork leg. Fresh off the fire, the meat was warm and tender. They had used a quality hog, by the taste of it.
"Ohh. Now that's the stuff."
"Hahaha. Good, right? I know I sound like a lovesick fool, but my wife is the best cook in this village."
"Well now. Sounds like you married up, boss."
"Hahahaha! Greatest thing I've ever done in my life!"
"Oh, honestly! Stop bothering the customer and get back to work!"
"R-right, sorry..."
A sharp woman's voice cut in from the kitchen, putting an end to the owner's spit-flecked boasting. It was the wife he had been so busy praising, and there was a flush of embarrassment in every word.
"First time in our village, isn't it? I don't believe I've seen your face before."
Chastised, the owner went back to wiping down tables in a halfhearted sort of way and struck up a conversation, glancing toward the kitchen as he did. It was late enough that I was the only customer in the place.
"Ah, yes. I arrived this afternoon."
"What brings you to our village?"
"I've been thinking it's about time I settled down somewhere. Haven't found a place that really suits me, so I've been looking around. Drifted from one town to the next and ended up here."
"Settling down, huh? What is it you do?"
"Just hunted monsters with this sword, that sort of thing."
I lifted the blade I had set beside me and showed it to him. Something about the answer lit his face right up.
What's gotten into him?
"Well I'll be! So you're a Master! And here I was treating you like anybody else!"
"I am a Master, yes, but I'm hardly anyone special. What's so precious about a man who couldn't even protect his own Fairy..."
I let out a sigh and put on a melancholy face, playing to his fussing. It was an act, and a calculated one. I needed information on Kant, and the owner was going to give it to me. The Fairies living with Kant had all lost their Masters. I had a cover that said I had lost my Fairy. It was the perfect story to draw out exactly what I wanted to hear.
"Is that right? Ah... I shouldn't have said that. I'm sorry."
"No, it's fine. It was a long time ago."
"Mm..."
He fidgeted, genuinely uncomfortable. If that wasn't an act, then the man was a simple, decent soul.
"Anyway, if you're looking for a place to settle, I'd recommend our village. And I don't say that just because I live here — objectively speaking, there aren't many villages as good as this one. We're close to Kenveli, under the Red Flame Queen, and the people here are all kind."
"Haha. Is that so? I can hear children laughing, so it does seem like a fine village."
I smiled and played along. He kept at it after that, working hard to sell me on every reason I ought to live here. I hadn't gotten the information I wanted, but I could tell why he was pitching so hard. He wanted me to stay — a man who could fight monsters.
A village outside the city walls had its advantages. The taxes were lower than what people paid inside. But that came with a fatal drawback: no high, thick walls to hide behind. Without walls, there was no guaranteeing anyone's safety from monsters that could come pouring in at any moment.
When they did, the village would send for reinforcements from the nearest city — the same city that collected their taxes. By the time those reinforcements arrived, the village would already be a smoking ruin. And even if they cobbled together a militia of ordinary people, the kind without status windows, it wouldn't amount to much.
For the village's sake, they needed a Master with at least some power. A Master could buy the villagers time to evacuate, if nothing else. But what Master in their right mind would settle in a village outside the city?
"Well, sir? Think you might settle here?"
"Hahaha. I'd like to look around a little more first. I'll take a walk through the village and give it some thought."
"Mm... all right, then... Ah! Have you seen the big building at the edge of the village?"
There it is.
The moment I went lukewarm on him, the disappointed owner finally started handing over the information I had been waiting for. The big building at the edge of the village — the place where Kant Kepri lived with the Fairies who had lost their Masters.
"Ah... I did see the building you mentioned. It's certainly large. Why do you ask?"
"Because it's a very special place. You might even find some peace of mind there yourself."
"Is that so? What kind of place are we talking about?"
"Well... I feel a bit awkward saying this when we've only just met, but... Fairies live there."
"Fairies?"
"That's right. Fairies who've lost their Masters, no less."
"Fairies who've lost their Masters are living there? How?"
"Well, you see..."
I put on an interested face and asked again, and he took it for a hook well swallowed. He told me everything he knew, talking eagerly, never once realizing that he was the one who had taken the bait.
I went upstairs to the room I had rented with a very satisfied look on my face.
The next day, I went back to the sanctuary where Kant was living.
"Excuse me."
"...Who are you?"
I spoke to the woman sweeping near the entrance, and she looked up at me with wary eyes. Her name was Loshuka — a 3-star Fairy with a striking bob of light green hair, fresh as spring grass. The gloom that hung over her face, however, stripped away every last bit of her charm.